Illinois Medical Insurance Options For The Uninsured

Living without medical insurance is indeed a risky endeavor. Your chances of getting ill or injured are not increased because you are without insurance. However your chances of serious complications or even death from an illness or injury is higher because you are more likely to put off seeking medical attention. The high cost of healthcare is something you strive to avoid because you know that one stay in the hospital can mean medical bills that can ruin your financial future and bring you to the brink of bankruptcy. If you are uninsured, stop what you are doing right now and start taking the necessary steps to put a medical insurance plan in place before the end of the day. An in other states around the country there is no excuse for going without Illinois medical insurance of some kind or another.  

The most popular option for Illinois medical insurance is work-sponsored group insurance coverage. It may even be subsidized in part by your employer. Whatever the case, all the guesswork is done for you. Someone else did the research on what type of policy to put in place, the deductibles and all the other options. In fact, you don’t even have to worry about missing a payment because they are automatically scheduled to come out of your check. However, this is the most costly type of medical insurance because you are paying to subsidize the healthcare costs of people in your group who are using it a lot. If you are a healthy individual you can get a much better price on individual health insurance.  

Getting quotes on individual and family medical insurance policies has never been easier. Use an online quote tool and input your personal information just once. In no time you’ll have quotes from various companies to compare and choose from. Because the rates are all quoted on the same information, it is easy to compare them. You can also personalize your policy to best fit your needs, once you have narrowed down the possible plans you wish to choose from. By opting to raise your out-of-pocket limits, your deductibles and your share of the coinsurance you can get your premiums even lower than the numbers quoted online. You also have the option to choose different types of plans if you feel that they would meet your needs and your budget better. 

Other options open to anyone who is uninsured include short term medical insurance. This is exactly what it sounds like, short term in order to help you out if you are between jobs or policies or in some other temporary situation of less than 1 year duration. You may also consider opting for major medical or catastrophic health insurance. This type of plan protects you should the worse happen, but it is also very limited and will not cover many health costs.  

There are also some government sponsored options that provide Illinois medical insurance coverage to people living in the state. Allkids exists in order to provide medical insurance for children and mothers who are expecting. There is also the Comprehensive Health Insurance Plan or CHIP, specifically for anyone who has been turned down for coverage. There are other plans available for the elderly and the poor.  

Get your options clear and understand what you are dealing with before you make any tough decisions about your Illinois medical insurance. 

Posted via web from besthealthcarerates's posterous

Georgia Medical Insurance Options For Self-Employed Individuals

Self-employed individuals are one of the most significant groups of uninsured people out there. It is a well-known fact that in Georgia, as well as throughout the country, those who are self-employed are often without medical insurance. In fact, it is lack of benefits such as medical insurance that prevents many people from taking the leap to work for themselves. However, many of those people would change their mind if they actually knew how inexpensive it can be to get your own medical insurance coverage. In some cases it may even be less costly than group insurance premiums. Get the facts on individual coverage for you quickly and easily online.  

Free online quote tools make it very efficient to shop around for prices on the different medical insurance options available for self-employed individuals or anyone who is without insurance. You simply input your zip code to start and then answer a short list of questions about your medical history and other relevant information. In no time you will have a variety of medical insurance quotes from insurance companies which serve your part of Georgia. It makes comparing prices and plans easy and time-efficient. 

By learning as much as possible about Georgia medical insurance you should be able to save yourself a significant amount on your premiums. Opt for a POS plan instead of a PPO, because even though PPOs give you the greatest amount of freedom in your healthcare options, you pay more for this freedom. A POS plan still gives you lots of choice but saves you money. Look for plans that offer money-saving perks like a Health Savings Account, so you can pay for healthcare costs with your pre-tax earnings. Discount cards are another thing you should look for when choosing the insurer to go with. These cards are considered “free perks” but can save you tremendously on various healthcare expenses that you would otherwise have to pay full-price for.  

After you have weighed the pros and cons of various health insurance companies and have limited your choices down, it is time to get in contact with them individually. Call up an agent at each of the companies you are considering using and ask for additional discounts. There are often ways to reduce your premium that are specific to each insurer and are not addressed by online quote tools. You may be able to save money by paying for the policy upfront. There may also be discounts if you take out another type of policy, like life insurance, with the same company. You may also be able to knock off a few dollars a month by raising out-of-pocket limits, deductibles and the portion of the co-insurance that you pay for.  

Remember that the cost of your self-employed individual medical insurance is an eligible business expense. This allows you to lower your taxable income by the amount you pay out in medical insurance premiums each year.  

Follow these tips, learn as much as possible about medical insurance and shop around for the best price. By doing so, you will find the best possible Georgia medical insurance plan for your needs, at a reasonable price too.

Posted via web from besthealthcarerates's posterous

Desperately Seeking Florida Medical Insurance Bargains

When people are faced with hard times and the need to seriously cut back on spending, they look at every single place their money goes. There are however some things that are regarded as necessities and therefore are untouchable. One of these things is group health insurance. Everyone needs medical insurance and many of us believe that the best option available is group plans. However, this may or may not be the case for you. If you are healthy, you may just be able to cut your medical insurance expenditures significantly. There are numerous ways to save on this type of non-negotiable, but only for those who are healthy.  

It is important to understand how group health insurance works so that you will know if it is actually your best friend or your worst enemy. Because everyone in a group must automatically be accepted into a group plan, the rates you pay are an average of what it would cost to insure everyone. Therefore if you are a very healthy person who rarely avails of the plan, you are paying for the health care premiums of others in your group who use it more regularly. If you have a chronic condition, a pre-existing condition or other health risk factors, being a member of a group health insurance plan is a great deal because you are paying much less that you would on an individual plan, if you were even eligible for one.  

The healthy Florida medical insurance shopper needs to learn about medical insurance, what differentiates the various plans out there and the meaning of terms such as co-insurance, deductibles, out-of-pocket, networks and more. Group policies are often PPOs, which are great plans that offer lots of choice and coverage, however they tend to be pricey. If you can live with a little less choice in your healthcare options, a POS plan can definitely save you significant amounts of money on your premiums. You can also save tremendously by opting for catastrophic health insurance or major medical as it is also known. This protects you in case of certain serious health events, but will not cover everything. Make sure you completely understand this type of policy before choosing it.  

The other major way to save on your Florida medical insurance is by making adjustments to your co-insurance rate, deductibles and out-of-pocket limits. When you have a group policy, these things are pre-set, but if you have an individual or family plan you can change them to suit your needs. A higher co-insurance rate will have you paying a higher percentage of the actual healthcare costs, but it will save on monthly premiums. Higher deductibles and out-of-pocket limits will also lower your premiums. One thing you should never adjust for the sake of premiums savings is the lifetime limit. Make sure it is high enough to adequately protect you should you get seriously ill or hurt.  

The other thing that will help save you money on your individual or family medical insurance policy is to shop around for the best price. Each insurer has slightly different guidelines and therefore there can be marked differences in price from one company to another. Get as many quotes as possible to find the absolute best deal. The easiest way to do this is by using a free online quote tool designed for medical insurance quotes. Just put in your zip code, answer the questions you see there and in no time you’ll have multiple Florida medical insurance quotes to choose from.  

Take your Florida medical insurance costs into your own hands and surprise yourself with the savings you’ll find there.

Posted via web from besthealthcarerates's posterous

Early Retirement and Arizona Medical Insurance

Gone are the days of Florida being every retirees dream. More and more of the baby boomer retirees have discovered and continue to discover the joys of living in Arizona during their retirement years. With a climate unlike any other in the United States, Arizona is becoming the hot spot for retirement. However as early retirees face life outside the corporate world, they are coming to realize that they now have to take care of certain things that were automatically done by the companies they worked for. One of the most important of these is healthcare insurance. Young retirees are learning that they need to take out private Arizona medical insurance to cover themselves, because they are no longer eligible for the group plans they always belonged to. Yet they are also too young for senior citizen’s healthcare plans. What this means is that in addition to all the changes that come with moving, retirees also have to shop for medical insurance.  

If you are in the market for Arizona medical insurance coverage, the ideal way to shop for it is online. Free quote tools for all types of insurance buying are easy to find and use. They provide you with a multitude of quotes from insurers who do business where you live. As with shopping for any type of insurance it is important to compare a variety of companies, their prices and their plans.  

To get started you simply input your zip code into the free online quote tool. It will then ask you several questions that are standard for health insurance rating purposes. Always respond to the questions honestly so that your quote will be accurate. Making false statements could lead to a policy being sold that is later cancelled and found to be fraudulent. After your personal information is input, the quote tool shares it with specific companies and they provide practically instantaneous quotes.  

The next step is for you to compare the information from the different companies and make a decision about which one works for you. Be sure that the policies you are quoted actually are comparable. Sometime companies have excellent prices, especially when compared with other firms, until you read the fine print and discover limitations and exclusions in the less expensive policies that are covered in the others. Make sure especially that lifetime limits, deductibles and co-payments are similar between all the policies you are comparing, so you can indeed compare apples to apples.  

Do some homework on the companies that quoted your Arizona medical insurance for retirees. Look into their records of complaints filed by customers. A simple online search can provide this information. If the company received too many complaints relative to their share of the market, you may want to reconsider using that insurer. Check out the insurance ratings the companies have received from independent insurance ratings firms like Standard and Poor’s or A.M. Best. An “A” or better indicates good economic stability and good future potential.  

If you are looking for medical insurance in Arizon for your post-retirement needs, look no further than the internet. Investigate the options that are offered and make sure that you know exactly what you are getting and from whom.

Posted via web from besthealthcarerates's posterous

Making California Medical Insurance Choices

California has a wide variety of medical insurance options to offer. While many people blindly accept the medical insurance coverage offered them through their employment, many others do not have this option. Luckily there are numerous companies out there that specialize in providing individual medical insurance plans. Some of the same companies that do group plans also offer individual options too. If you are without medical insurance coverage in the state of California, you can rest assured that there are lots of options out there for you. You just need to know how to choose the best one for you. 

You need to take various things into consideration when looking at your medical insurance options. The most important thing to consider is your own health and how often you actually use the healthcare system. If you are healthy and almost never need to go to the doctor, you will want to look into California individual medical insurance options because you will often find that they are more tailored to your needs and can even be less expensive than group plans. However, if you are one of the unlucky individuals who has chronic illness, is often ill or is suffering from a disease currently, you best option will be group health insurance. If you fall into this category, chances are you may not even be insurable on your own, therefore seize the opportunity for group coverage. Even if you could get individual coverage, chances are the premiums would be simply too high because of the risk you present to the insurer. 

The region you reside in will also impact the choices you get when it comes to California medical insurance. If you live in Southern California and there are HMO facilities nearby like Kaiser-Permanente, you will have that option as well as PPO and POS plans. However if you live in any other part of the state where HMOs are not offered, your choice will be more limited. 

Your personal preferences play a big role in the medical care choices you make. You may prefer to have a major amount of control over whom you see and where you are treated in terms of healthcare. If so, you will want to opt for a PPO. However if you’d rather let a primary care doctor control every aspect of your healthcare, a HMO is the way to go. Alternatively a POS or Point of Service plan is a good mix of each of these plans giving you more options and control while a primary care doctor oversees your care.  

Everywhere you turn as you seek to make the right choice for your own California medical insurance you will be faced with different things to consider. If you opt to go with an individual plan, you will do best if you tailor it to your anticipated use of it. This also allows you to help it fit better into your budget. Raise deductibles and out-of-pocket limits in order to lower your premium. You can also keep the cost down by increasing the portion of the co-insurance rate that you are responsible for. 

Look carefully at the myriad of things to consider before making your final decision on your California medical insurance. There is a plan out there for just about everyone.

Posted via web from besthealthcarerates's posterous

Texas Medical Insurance Companies And You

If you are a Texan faced with the daunting proposition of finding medical insurance coverage, you have your hands full. There are so many companies offering such coverage in Texas that you will need to invest some time into the process to make sure that you get the best coverage to meet your needs at the best price possible. By learning as much as you can about Texas medical insurance options you will be well-equipped for the choice of which company to go with.  

The first step is to narrow down the exhaustingly long list of possible insurance providers in the Lone Star State. The best way to do this is to go online and get individual health insurance quotes using a free online quote tool that gives you a variety of quotes from companies serving your part of the state. Despite the fact that all companies are quoting on the exact same information, the prices will vary, therefore this will allow you to easily limit the number of insurers to consider. Only those with the best prices will go to the next step.  

Look into the financial stability of any company that you are seriously considering working with. You want to know that if you actually do need to avail yourself of the medical benefits you are paying for that the company will be around and liquid enough to be able to cover your expenses as need be. The number one way to check on an insurer’s financial and economic status is to get their insurance rating. Independent insurance rating companies, namely Weiss Ratings, Standard and Poor’s, A.M. Best and Moody’s, assign a letter grade to insurance companies based on their current financial strength and ability to meet future obligations. Gravitate towards companies with an A or A+ rating. 

Your choice of Texas health insurance companies should also be determined by how well or poorly the company deals with its customers. Having good customer service is a priority when searching for a new provider. Check out the Texas Department of Insurance website and you will find a listing of all the medical insurance companies and their complaint index. Stay away from companies that have a higher than usual complaint index because it is a good indicator that they are poor at customer service.  

Finally you should weigh the pros and cons of each individual company when all other things are equal. There are bound to be many differences from one company to another, in terms of the actual medical insurance product. At some companies it is a plain simple insurance policy. However, for other companies it comes with real value-adding supplements like online health information access, member discount cards and much more. Know exactly what each offers so you can factor those things in to your decision. 

Take your time as you go over all the options before you. Medical insurance is an important part of your financial security and should be taken seriously. By weighing all the factors carefully, you will find the best possible Texas medical insurance policy for you.

Posted via web from besthealthcarerates's posterous

Doctor Says It's Not Health Insurance, But Cost That Is The Problem!

While most Americans favor health care reform, the majority are now against proposed plans that expand the government role in providing health care. The public is not only skeptical of the promise of improved access and delivery, but also very suspicious about claims of cost reduction through the elimination of waste. Historically, health care programs end up costing five to ten times their original estimates.

For instance, Hawaii tried a system with a public option intended to cover more individuals; the program was dropped within seven months as costs spiraled out of control. Other states have had similar experiences.

A major problem with the current health insurance model is that it does not work for services used on a routine basis. Insurance is designed to work for services that are unexpected and is a very poor and ineffective method of delivery for routine, expected services. With such a system, costs skyrocket and care is poor.

With the current health insurance model the only cost containment is denial of service by the insurer. Patients with insurance pay a premium, so rightfully they want to get as much as they can for their money. Similarly, doctors seek as much treatment as they can from the health insurance company, being naturally drawn to procedures that are paid the most by the insurers. Thus, to contain costs insurance companies must deny treatment. Medical decisions are influenced more by what the insurance company will likely pay for than what is medically appropriate. Routine medical treatments are routinely denied payment or require “prior authorizations” from doctors, meaning they must fill out multiple forms to prove their patient needs a particular treatment. As a result, costs rise and care declines.

Doctors start to realize what the insurance company will pay for, which is usually high price procedures and specialty services. Over time this results in huge amounts of unnecessary costs and an overabundance of specialists (lack of primary care physicians). Care further declines because physicians find that they can make much more money by spending little time with patients. Doctors are no longer doctors but rather now serve as intermediaries between the health insurance company and patients.

The system needs to change so that it empowers patients and physicians to work together to provide the most appropriate treatment in the most cost-effective manner. Medical savings accounts – with negotiated rates to prevent overcharging – would be a step in the right direction. An even more significant change would be converting to payment on a cash basis. We have found that, almost without exception, laboratories, doctors, and other services will happily take 70% less if paid in cash at the time of service. They have found that their costs are increased by that much if they have to bill health insurance companies and incur other expenses – plus the risk of denial – in an effort to obtain payment which, if approved, generally arrives 30 to 300 days after initial billing. For instance, we have contracts with the major laboratories at 70% less than what they bill insurance companies. CT scans and MRIs, usually billed $2500 to $3000 to insurers, are contracted at a rate of $300; colonoscopies that doctors bill at $1500 are done for $400. The cost savings are not in the care but rather the system.

Most patients with “good” medical insurance are relieved when their insurance pays 50-70% of the bill. They are of course surprised to find, however, that their co-pay is usually more than the cash price would have been for the service. An example is patient SC who visited our office. Extensive lab work was done (21 tests). The lab billed the insurance $1800 and the insurance paid $1200; the patient was billed a $600 co-pay. The cash price would have been less than $400.

What is the solution? It is to expand medical saving accounts. But in doing so, the government must require that all doctors, laboratories, hospitals and other services post their rates, and cash must be the least expensive rate. With these entities competing against one another, costs will plummet and quality will improve.

You ask what about those who cannot pay out of pocket. Instead of an employer paying, say, $500/month to a third party payer, $400 per month goes into the medical saving account and $100 towards catastrophic care insurance. Most of the money rolls over each month to be potentially used in the future, but some can be returned to the patient. This is a big incentive to keep costs low. With all the money saved on routine and semi-emergent care, better health insurance can be provided for those most in need. Under this model, physicians would be able to provide the best medical care possible at the most cost-effective price.

Posted via web from besthealthcarerates's posterous