Getting health insurance in Houston if you’re high risk
Reader question:
I’m from Texas and I’m having a hard time finding health insurance in Houston because I’m considered ‘high risk’. What do I do?
Marvin
There’s always something that you can do.
The health insurance business, indeed, the entire insurance business, be it life, health, or auto, functions around formulas that determine the risk of a potential customer. Medical health insurance companies provide health coverage, but they only want to provide to the people who need it least, and want to make it as difficult as possible to use. This is natural to a business, as they would much prefer to have money coming in than out. This makes it difficult for people who are more like to use medical health insurance coverage to get insured, but there are certain fall back plans set in place to help them out.
If you are looking for medical health insurance in Houston, Texas, then you should consider getting involved with the Texas Health Insurance Risk Pool. This, which makes it easier to get high risk health insurance in Houston and the rest of the state, was created as Texas’s response to the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. It helps out poeple who find that medical health insurance companies turn them down more often than not because they have a condition or history that makes it to where they require more health care.
It works pretty much the same way as much health insurance in Houston, even down, strangely, to the fact that in the first year of your policy you aren’t covered for any pre-existing conditions. It does, however, allow for hospital stays and trips to the emergency room with small deductibles.
It may be the only option for someone who needs health insurance in Houston and can’t get it anywhere else, but that doesn’t mean that it will be cheap. As a matter of fact, with a one thousand dollar deductible, it could end up with a monthly cost of up to five hundred for a 36 year old man, and up to six hundred for a woman of the same age.
Cheers,
Fashun Guadarrama.
Individual medical health insurance: it costs a lot
Reader question:
How much does individual medical health insurance tend to cost, and what affects those rates?
Mandy
Good question.
There are many states who mandate that individual health insurance companies insure anybody who wants to be insured and can pay, but this isn’t true everywhere, and there also isn’t a set amount of what you will be paying. Most of the time, it will be a lot. Individual medical health insurance is very pricey, and it all depends on who you are, what your history is, and where you are at. Group plans are a lot cheaper because the number of people dilutes the risks of others in the group and it ends up averaging out, whereas for individual health insurance it’s always concentrated in one person.
An individual medical health insurance plan is usually underwritten so the health insurance company can judge your rates based on your medical history. There are a lot of things that can affect your rates in the end, even things that you wouldn’t think would affect it, such as having been pregnant at some point. Those things can be the difference between high prices and middling ones, being insured and being uninsured.
Individual medical health insurance coverage comes with much the same coverage as group medical health insurance coverage, except for the requirement of individual coverage that it be underwritten. Here are some factors considered by the underwriter:
- Age. If you’re over the age of sixty five, you might be out of luck when it comes to getting medical health insurance. Age is a big factor in who is or is nor eligible for medical health insurance.
- Sex. Benefits of your gender depend on how old you are. When people are longer, females tend to get injured more often and file more health insurance claims than males. Once they turn sixty, it’s vice verce.
- Health History and Physical Condition. Things like pre-existing conditions can make it hard to get decent medical health insuranc coverage. You might luck out and be able to get a different, more limited kind of coverage, but it’s often the case that you will be denied coverage completely.
- Job and Hobbies. What you do in your work and spare time may be more dangerous than what other people do and could result in higher rates or denial of coverage. If you like sky diving or work in construction, you might have trouble getting decent medical health insurance rates.
Cheers,
Fashun Guadarrama.
Who can get temporary health insurance?
Reader question:
Who can get temporary health insurance?
Mark
Great question.
One of the reasons that short term health insurance is able to offer its policies at such low monthly prices is because it has much stricter limits on who can be covered under one of its medical health insurance plans. It creates a stricter requirement, and thus those that purchase a short term health insurance plan are part of a pool that has less risk, and with less risk come fewer health insurance claims, and with fewer health insurance claims come cheaper rates.
Usually you can’t get short term health insurance if you are over the age of sixty five. More problems that are similar to the amount of pre-existing conditions come with older age, so short term health insurance companies don’t want to cover people who have the higher risk of getting sick or injured more often. It’s also true that if you applied for a health insurance policy before and were denied, you might not be able to get a temporary health insurance policy.
If you already have a health insurance policy that covers you, even if it’s coverage is very limited, you probably won’t be able to get short term health insurance to pick up the slack. Temporary health insurance plans have several requirements, and you’ll probably have to be within a certain height and weight range in order to qualify. It’s also true that there are several questions that you will be asked about your health history that you will have to answer correctly in order to be allowed to take out a short term health insurance policy.
Cheers,
Fashun Guadarrama.
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