Affordable Health Insurance Plans For People With Cancer

Finding cheap health insurance coverage these days is difficult but locating cheap health insurance with cancer is believed by a lot of people to be all but impossible. However, as long as you know where to look it is easier than you may think.

The principle difficulty facing people with cancer when when it comes to looking for health insurance is the fact that just about all plans carry exclusions for pre-existing conditions which will exclude cover altogether for a particular condition, cover a condition at an additional cost or provide cover at normal rates but require a 'waiting period' before coverage comes into effect. Most people are frightened off simply by the phrase 'pre-existing condition exclusions' but it is frequently not as frightening as they think.

Most people fall into two categories when looking for medical insurance – those who are looking for a private individual health insurance plan and those who are looking for coverage through a group medical insurance plan.

Those individuals looking for an individual plan need to start by deciding on the type of policy that you require and then shop around for one that gives you the coverage you want at a price that you can afford. Your choice is essentially between a Fee-for-Service (or indemnity) plan, a Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) plan, a Point-of-Service Plan (POS) or a Preferred Provider Organization (PPO) plan. Naturally, there are pros and cons to each of these plans but, within each category, you will normally discover several plans which meet your needs.

Should you be looking at a group medical plan then you will probably either be looking at a plan provided by an employer or looking at one of the large number of plans available through such things as motoring organizations, clubs or senior citizen groups.

A group plan provided by an employer is often the best option for a person with cancer who is trying to get around the issue of pre-existing exclusion clauses as these schemes are tightly controlled by both federal and state laws which restrict insurers when it comes to imposing exclusions. For example, an insurer is not allowed to deny you cover simply because of a pre-existing condition and, if you are moving from one scheme to another and have a break in cover of fewer than 63 days, no exclusion period will be imposed providing a condition was covered and any exclusion period was completed under your previous scheme. Additionally, when you are required to wait for cover, an employer's scheme cannot make you wait more than 12 months.

Group policies, other than those provided by an employer, will also generally treat pre-existing conditions more favorably than individual policies, but here you must look carefully at each plan.

If you are sitting back and doing nothing because you believe that you cannot get medical insurance as a result of having cancer then think again. You might be surprised to discover that you can not only get cover, but can get it at a price which you can afford. So, begin shopping around and then get yourself an online discount medical insurance quote.