Now Specific Health Insurance for Specific Illness

Generally, health insurance policies cover individuals who have very less specific health problems. If any, mostly have an additional premium, a long waiting period and even some companies do not cover some illnesses completely.  A critical illness policy tries to fill this gap by covering few very critical illnesses but then it’s once in a lifetime claim and mainly helps in meeting the high expenses during hospitalization. But there are many expenses which are unbearable since they are recurring. In absence of any health insurance scheme for your specific illness, you have to dive into your savings or look at additional source of income if theses recurring medical expenses are eating a lot of pie.  But things seem to be changing now. Considering the too much generalization of products and finer norms by IRDA, companies have to think beyond general health insurance schemes. They are coming out with specific health insurance products which appeals to the left out category .i.e. people who are already suffering from some illnesses or are in very early stage.

Here are few such products launched last year by companies catering to different illnesses. This is not a comprehensive analysis of the products but a review on how companies are now getting into specific health insurances and what you can expect in the future:

Diabetes

It’s a common problem which can happen in a very young age. Even children’s too suffer from this illness at times. Till now, diabetes was covered in general health schemes after a waiting period of 3-6 years and by paying an additional premium for it. Even here this feature was mostly available with PSUs and many private companies like Apollo Munich did not covered diabetic patients at all. Star Health and ICICI Lombard were two companies which were running specific policies for covering this specific illness. Star Diabetic Care is still available now. But in December 2013, Apollo Munich came out its health policy –Energy, for diabetic patients. The product covers this illness from the first day but has some conditions and unlike like Star health, covers hypertension and pre-diabetes along with type 2 diabetes. There are other features in this policy like, rewards for regular health checkup to control diabetes, a lower premium in case of co-payment etc. which are considerable. One need to check the policy wordings clearly to know the actual coverage as there are waiting periods with some illnesses along with pre-existing illness. One can expect more such products in future which will be a good bargain for diabetic patients.

Heart Attack

Young individuals are too getting prone to heart attack due to unhealthy lifestyle. Although hospital expenses at its diagnosis is covered in a general health scheme it is also one of the major illnesses in the critical health insurance schemes. But this too is limited to first heat attack and will mostly cover a lumpsum amount. The bigger problem than arises for people who have reached to the stage of surgeries as more money is needed to cover post expenses. There is no mediclaim which can cover this illness from day 1. Star health Insurance launched Cardiac Care especially for heart patients last year. This policy goes to the extent of covering patients, who have already cardiac ailments, from 91^st day itself. This includes the cardiac surgeries in last 6 months-3 years. Although the product has its own limitations related to the coverage amount and waiting periods, it’s the only option available to people suffering from cardiac ailments and not covered at all. Products like these if launched by more companies can be a big relief for people with this ailment.

 Cancer

This is also an illness which is generally covered in all critical illness policies along with hospitalization expenses in general health insurance. But like others, there is a waiting period, coverage is limited to once in life time and covers only advanced stages. Considering the high cost of treatment for this illness many a times it creates a big hole in family expenses. Not new but there are two companies which have policies specifically for cancer patients. Although they do not cover you if your illness is pre-existing like in the case of mesothelioma compensation, but the coverage is still wide enough if one get diagnosed with cancer. One of them is the ICICI Pru Life Cancer Care which is a comprehensive plan and covers cancer specifically after waiting period of 6 & 12 months for early and advanced stages. This is a long term policy for 10 years as it is from a life insurance company. The other options are policies from National Insurance in association with Cancer Patients Aid Association and Indian Cancer Society. Among these two policies the first has many limitations and is a once in life time claim but the second has a very wide coverage with benefits like quarterly reimbursement for expenses such as biopsy, diagnosis, hospitalization, surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and rehabilitation. Since both these policies are from general insurance company they are yearly renewable. There will be conditions associated with such policies information of which one can avail from the company or the association.

Specific Insurance Policies are becoming a new motto for health insurance companies which are a welcome move for buyers. We will see many such products coming in the future. Whether they fulfill your requirement is something one has to analyze but if more such specific policies are available it will help in meeting needs of more number of health insurance seekers.

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