How do you express gratitude to your mother? A well-worded message, maybe? How about a thoughtfully selected gift item? What if you do not want it to be merely symbolic or metaphorical?
Buying health insurance might be a perfect option.
Read on to understand why.
A Sudden Unplanned Hospitalisation may cause a Financial Emergency Situation
Imagine the undesirable event of your mother needing treatment at a hospital. It may mean that her ailment is severe. Having to see a loved one go through such trauma is bad enough in itself. The high cost of sudden hospitalisation may also cause financial trauma. If there is a shortfall of funds, you might need to borrow from friends and family.
Now you have to recover from two traumatic events. One is the physical recovery of the loved one. The other is the recovery from the financial situation.
Buying Health Insurance to Mitigate High Hospitalisation Costs
Is there a way to mitigate this situation? Yes. A health insurance policy covers the hospitalisation expenses of the insured persons. Buying health insurance for father and mother will minimise the financial trauma.
How to go about buying health insurance?
Read along to know more.
Assess the Current Health Insurance Cover
Ask your mother if she has any health insurance. If yes, ask her to share the policy document. Check if the cover is enough? The chances are that she might be holding a policy purchased years ago. It may not be enough to cover her medical expenses today because of medical inflation. Perform the same exercise for the rest of the family. There are a few options that you may assess here.
Read along to know more about them.
Family Floater Plan
A family floater plan covers the medical expenses of all added family members. The premium on a floater plan is also lower compared to the premium of individual policies. You can get a family floater plan for the entire family, including your mother. If you already have a family floater plan, you may add your mother to it. However, you should be aware of a few insurance facts and nuances here.
Read on to know more.
Higher Premiums for Older People
As age increases, the health risk of the insured person increases. It means that as you get older, you are more prone to diseases and ailments. Insurance companies know this and charge higher premiums for health insurance for older people. Insurers may also impose other conditions.
Read on to understand what they are.
Copay Clause
In a lot of cases, the insurance company may mandate a copay plan. This is due to the inclusion of the senior in a family floater plan. The copay clause will then apply to everyone on the plan.
A copay clause means that the insured person has to pay a portion of the cost. This applies to every claim made. Consider an example of a policy with a 20% copay clause. The cost of hospitalisation is ₹2.5 Lakh. Here, the insured person will have to pay ₹ 50 Thousand, and the insurance company will pay the rest, i.e. ₹2 Lakh.
This is not desirable for every claim made for every insured person on the floater plan. Can you optimise the health insurance cover to reduce copay to the minimum extent possible? Yes, by going for different policies as described below.
Non-Seniors on a Family Floater and Seniors on a Senior Health Insurance Plan
You can reduce the number of insured persons with a copay clause by purchasing different policies.
One can be a family floater with lower premiums and no copay for non-senior citizens.
The other can be a senior citizen policy for the mother with a copay and higher premiums.
This might turn out to be costlier than having everyone on the family floater. However, since everyone is not on copay, you can reduce the actual hospitalisation costs significantly.
Hospitalisation is Getting Expensive
The cost of everything around you has risen. So has the cost of hospitalisation. Along with it, the cost of consulting specialist doctors and medical tests has increased as well. As it turns out, treatment at a good hospital today is far more expensive. Even when you compare it with what it used to be only a few years ago, this rise in medical expenses is called medical inflation.
Pick the Option Best Suitable for You
Buying health insurance for a mother is about much more than expressing gratitude. It is a very practical means of mitigating a probable, undesirable and traumatic situation. You can learn more about medical insurance for fathers here. Pick the options most appropriate for you from the ones described above.
You can also read about Cost Analysis of Parent’s Health Insurance here.