What Factors Affect Illinois Individual Health Insurance?
When purchasing individual health care insurance, a number of factors should be evaluated before selecting a final policy. There is the choice between HMO vs. PPO type policies, the amount of out of pocket expenses (yearly deductibles and co-payments), and the financial stability of the insurance company to consider. But, perhaps, the most significant criterion to affect your coverage is the insurance provider's practices on the medical underwriting of applicants.
The medical underwriting of individual health insurance policies is dramatically different from practices in group health insurance programs. By law, in a group insurance plan, there cannot be discrimination in coverage applied to any group member based on that member's individual health status. However, for individual insurance plans, discrimination resulting from individual health status is routinely practiced today and is completely legal! If an applicant for an individual health insurance policy has a disability or pre-existing condition, the insurance provider is free to deny coverage to the applicant or to offer only coverage that excludes the disability or condition.
This practice occurs as a result of the required medical underwriting of a new health insurance policy which applies to many newly issued policies purchased in the open marketplace. What medical underwriting really means is that the insurance provider is evaluating the potential financial risk attributable to the new policy based on the health status of the applicant. Before applying for a new insurance policy, consumers must always talk to the medical underwriting department of the insurance provider first to find out how they deal with various medical issues.