What Factors Affect Pennsylvania Individual Health Insurance?
When learning about individual health insurance, multiple key factors should be considered before selecting that final policy. There are differences between HMO and PPO type plans, the degree of out of pocket fees (annual deductibles and co-payments), and the financial resources of the insurance provider to consider. However, possibly the most important criterion to affect your insurance coverage is the insurance company's practices on the medical underwriting of individual applicants.
The practice of medical underwriting for individual insurance policies differs dramatically from what occurs in group insurance plans. Per the law, in a group health insurance plan, there can be no discrimination in coverage provided to any member of the group based on the individual's health status. In contrast, for individual health insurance plans, discrimination based on the individual's current health status is actively practiced today and is considered completely legal! If any person who applies for an individual insurance policy has a medical disability or pre-existing health condition, the insurance company is free to refuse coverage to the applicant or may provide only health coverage that excludes the disability or condition.
This practice results from the medical underwriting of every individual health insurance policy which applies to most new policies bought in the open marketplace. What the concept of medical underwriting actually means is that the insurance company is evaluating the financial risk under the new policy based on the specific health status of the applicant. When thinking about new health insurance, consumers should always talk to the medical underwriting specialists of the insurance company first to learn more about how they will respond on specific health conditions.