Health insurance for special situations

by Tony Novak, CPA, MBA, MT
, revised 11/21/2011

Finding affordable health insurance can be difficult for people with specific medical conditions or other concerns flagged by most health insurance companies.  Most of these individuals who need fast affordable coverage will keep the policy for a year or less.  Limited term coverage and limited benefit health insurance are attractive options available at only a fraction of the cost of other health insurance plans. Most low cost health insurance plans exclude certain individuals from eligibility so these potential members find themselves searching the Web to try to find a suitable health insurance plan. Regrettably many wind up enrolling in health plans that are too good to be true, and are really little more than online marketing scams. (Other articles by the author on health plan scams may be found at www.tonynovak.com ). Freedom Benefits provides state-by-state resource listings of many low cost / high quality health insurance plans.

This article focuses on a few specialty health insurance plans available in four common types of difficult situations:

1. Applicant who is overweight, diabetic, has high cholesterol or high blood pressure
2. Applicant is not a U.S. citizen
3. Applicant needs insurance coverage for a pre-existing medical condition
4. Immediate proof of coverage and ID card are required

While there may be more than one insurance company available to cover each situation, this chart is limited to the preferred choice in each situation. Preferences are based on quality of coverage, price and ease of online application. In some cases no suitable health insurance carrier is available. Each of the companies listed has established a reputation for providing quality service and secure online enrollment. Most of these policies have a maximum length of coverage per policy, but you may re-enroll for another policy (except in CO, GA, and MN) to continue coverage for longer period of time.

As a last resort, each state has at least open enrollment health plan available to all residents. Information is available through the state insurance department. (Contact information is available for each state at Freedom Benefits). This state-mandated open enrollment plan might be very expensive so it makes sense to exhaust all other possibilities first. These state-mandated open enrollment insurance plans are not available on the Internet, so a telephone call or personal visit will be required to obtain enrollment information. Many of these open enrollment plans are handled through local Blue Cross / Blue Shield Associations.

Specialty Product Availability Chart

A red block indicates that no suitable coverage is available.

Footnotes:

¹ Core Health Insurance covers all pre-exiting conditions after 12 months. 

² Celtic does not allow re-enrollment but a second option is available through TIG. This plan allows enrollment to those who have been previously been declined for health insurance as long as the decline was not within the past 12 months.

³ All insurance plans issued online by HPA Inc. including TIG allow immediate printing of the ID card at the time of online enrollment

Opinions expressed are the solely those of the author and do not represent the position of any other person, company or entity mentioned in the article. Information is from sources believed to be reliable but cannot be guaranteed. Any accounting, business or tax advice contained in this communication, including attachments and enclosures, is not intended as a thorough, in-depth analysis of specific issues or a substitute for a formal opinion, nor is it sufficient to avoid tax-related penalties. Tony Novak operates as an independent adviser under the trademarks "Freedom Benefits", "OnlineAdviser" and "OnlineNavigator" but is not a representative, agent, broker, producer or navigator for any securities broker dealer firm, federal or state health insurance marketplace or qualified health plan carrier. He has no financial position in any stocks mentioned. Novak does work as an accountant, agent, adviser, writer, consultant, marketer, reviewer, endorser, producer, lead generator or referrer to other companies including the companies listed in the articles on this web site.

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