Changing Insurance
I took on a temp-to-perm position last June in hopes that I would be hired quickly as promised. It had been my goal to land a full-time job with benefits before my COBRA ran out so I could continue with my surveillance protocol for cancer.
For the uninitiated, COBRA allows you to continue your employer-provided health coverage after you've been laid off from your job. COBRA can be expensive because you are no longer eligible for the group discount you received while working for your employer. During previous layoffs, my rates have tripled when I'm on COBRA, which can be a real struggle to pay for when you aren't working.
This last time was different. Thanks to government subsidies due to the recession, my COBRA costs this time around were less than 40% of what they could have been. So it was a no-brainer to keep the insurance.
Unfortunately, the subsidies ran out in March, falling two months short of the maximum of 18 months you can be on COBRA. My rates shot up as a result. I decided to cancel it. I figured since my cancer had officially past the five-year benchmark for remission that I would have no problem transitioning to my own insurance.
One drawback to this plan was that my insurance provider didn't offer individual policies in the State of California. So, no matter what, I was going to have to switch providers once COBRA ended. Instead of transitioning from a group policy to an individual one under the same provider, I now had to apply for insurance to a new potential provider on the open insurance market from scratch. I chose to apply at one that had both my general practitioner and oncologist listed in their directory. I've been with my GP for ten years and my oncologist for five. I knew and trusted both of them and wanted the consistency of those relationships to continue.
One of the questions on my potential provider's form is whether or not you've had cancer in the last TEN years instead of the gold standard of five. Uh-oh, I thought. It took two weeks for my potential insurance provider to get back to me on my application, which is typical. They wanted more answers on my cancer experience, asking me to have my doctors provide my medical records. I did as they asked, writing letters to my doctors to have the records transferred over. I had hoped that having been with this potential provider years before would help my cause in addition to having passed two recent physicals.
When you've had a major disease like cancer, you go through many diagnostic tests. In my case, blood tests, X-Rays, and CT-Scans are part of the normal regimen for my surveillance protocol, where I'm observed closely through scheduled checkups for any new tumors. If any are detected, then we have to decide what my next course of treatment will be. As a result, each of these tests is heavily scrutinized by my doctor for any anomalies. If there are any anomalies, then those are looked at even more closely with more diagnostic tests and treatment possible. Over the course of several years, it's a given you will have some scares along the way.
The last scare was in February of last year when they discovered a possible problem in one of my lungs. After my oncologist consulted with his colleagues, they determined it was nothing to worry about. Try telling that to a potential insurance provider whose underwriters are working hard to make sure you don't get insurance if you are a risk to their company. It took the potential provider two months to get back to me.
I had been hoping to get my insurance with this potential provider within the 60 days of canceling my COBRA. Once you are over that 60 days, you lose HIPAA eligibility, which guarantees you coverage no matter your pre-existing medical condition. Because it took so long for the potential provider to get back to me, I lost my HIPAA eligibility, which put me at this provider's mercy. I hadn't considered that I might get rejected, so I had only applied at this one provider — besides, it makes the application process easier when you only have to deal with one company at a time.
In their letter, they cited several instances in my surveillance protocol as reasons to get more clarification from my doctors on my current health. The two physicals I passed earlier that year should have been enough to quell any doubts, but the underwriters dug deep into my past to make it difficult for me. I contacted my physicians again, but time wasn't on my side since I was now two months without health insurance and I had a scheduled cancer surveillance checkup fast approaching. It didn't help that I had suffered a severe ankle sprain that needed treatment during this break in coverage, proving to me that, yes, I really did need insurance.
When the potential provider got back to me, they determined they STILL didn't have enough information to give me one of their standard policies, saying that I needed to go in for a new physical despite having passed two already that year. I was pretty offended by this. I now had to pay for a third physical in six months just to appease some underwriters holed up in an office somewhere. Ridiculous.
Fortunately, they couldn't deny me coverage because of HIPAA and I had to apply for that if I was to get insurance from them so I could retain the services of my longtime doctors. The cost difference? HIPAA costs were double of the standard policies and four times what I paid under COBRA with subsidies. Ouch. I gave up on them as a result. It was obvious they didn't want my money.
Compounding the problem was the delay in hiring me full-time at my temp-to-perm position. They kept inexplicably putting it off despite weeks of promises that it would be 'soon.' When my manager decided to retire, that threw a major wrench in my plans because he now had no sway over me being hired despite his best efforts to do so before he left. Since I was only a freelancer, they didn't provide me any benefits.
Desperate for insurance, I went with a provider that didn't have my doctors in their directories. Within four weeks, I was accepted without having to contact my previous doctors or provide additional information on my cancer experience, just as it should have been. The rates ended up being the same as the standard ones from the other provider, but losing my doctors was a real mental blow. As a result, I was not looking forward to my upcoming cancer surveillance checkup in a new environment with new doctors and nurses, though I was glad to have insurance again.
For the uninitiated, COBRA allows you to continue your employer-provided health coverage after you've been laid off from your job. COBRA can be expensive because you are no longer eligible for the group discount you received while working for your employer. During previous layoffs, my rates have tripled when I'm on COBRA, which can be a real struggle to pay for when you aren't working.
This last time was different. Thanks to government subsidies due to the recession, my COBRA costs this time around were less than 40% of what they could have been. So it was a no-brainer to keep the insurance.
Unfortunately, the subsidies ran out in March, falling two months short of the maximum of 18 months you can be on COBRA. My rates shot up as a result. I decided to cancel it. I figured since my cancer had officially past the five-year benchmark for remission that I would have no problem transitioning to my own insurance.
One drawback to this plan was that my insurance provider didn't offer individual policies in the State of California. So, no matter what, I was going to have to switch providers once COBRA ended. Instead of transitioning from a group policy to an individual one under the same provider, I now had to apply for insurance to a new potential provider on the open insurance market from scratch. I chose to apply at one that had both my general practitioner and oncologist listed in their directory. I've been with my GP for ten years and my oncologist for five. I knew and trusted both of them and wanted the consistency of those relationships to continue.
One of the questions on my potential provider's form is whether or not you've had cancer in the last TEN years instead of the gold standard of five. Uh-oh, I thought. It took two weeks for my potential insurance provider to get back to me on my application, which is typical. They wanted more answers on my cancer experience, asking me to have my doctors provide my medical records. I did as they asked, writing letters to my doctors to have the records transferred over. I had hoped that having been with this potential provider years before would help my cause in addition to having passed two recent physicals.
When you've had a major disease like cancer, you go through many diagnostic tests. In my case, blood tests, X-Rays, and CT-Scans are part of the normal regimen for my surveillance protocol, where I'm observed closely through scheduled checkups for any new tumors. If any are detected, then we have to decide what my next course of treatment will be. As a result, each of these tests is heavily scrutinized by my doctor for any anomalies. If there are any anomalies, then those are looked at even more closely with more diagnostic tests and treatment possible. Over the course of several years, it's a given you will have some scares along the way.
The last scare was in February of last year when they discovered a possible problem in one of my lungs. After my oncologist consulted with his colleagues, they determined it was nothing to worry about. Try telling that to a potential insurance provider whose underwriters are working hard to make sure you don't get insurance if you are a risk to their company. It took the potential provider two months to get back to me.
I had been hoping to get my insurance with this potential provider within the 60 days of canceling my COBRA. Once you are over that 60 days, you lose HIPAA eligibility, which guarantees you coverage no matter your pre-existing medical condition. Because it took so long for the potential provider to get back to me, I lost my HIPAA eligibility, which put me at this provider's mercy. I hadn't considered that I might get rejected, so I had only applied at this one provider — besides, it makes the application process easier when you only have to deal with one company at a time.
In their letter, they cited several instances in my surveillance protocol as reasons to get more clarification from my doctors on my current health. The two physicals I passed earlier that year should have been enough to quell any doubts, but the underwriters dug deep into my past to make it difficult for me. I contacted my physicians again, but time wasn't on my side since I was now two months without health insurance and I had a scheduled cancer surveillance checkup fast approaching. It didn't help that I had suffered a severe ankle sprain that needed treatment during this break in coverage, proving to me that, yes, I really did need insurance.
When the potential provider got back to me, they determined they STILL didn't have enough information to give me one of their standard policies, saying that I needed to go in for a new physical despite having passed two already that year. I was pretty offended by this. I now had to pay for a third physical in six months just to appease some underwriters holed up in an office somewhere. Ridiculous.
Fortunately, they couldn't deny me coverage because of HIPAA and I had to apply for that if I was to get insurance from them so I could retain the services of my longtime doctors. The cost difference? HIPAA costs were double of the standard policies and four times what I paid under COBRA with subsidies. Ouch. I gave up on them as a result. It was obvious they didn't want my money.
Compounding the problem was the delay in hiring me full-time at my temp-to-perm position. They kept inexplicably putting it off despite weeks of promises that it would be 'soon.' When my manager decided to retire, that threw a major wrench in my plans because he now had no sway over me being hired despite his best efforts to do so before he left. Since I was only a freelancer, they didn't provide me any benefits.
Desperate for insurance, I went with a provider that didn't have my doctors in their directories. Within four weeks, I was accepted without having to contact my previous doctors or provide additional information on my cancer experience, just as it should have been. The rates ended up being the same as the standard ones from the other provider, but losing my doctors was a real mental blow. As a result, I was not looking forward to my upcoming cancer surveillance checkup in a new environment with new doctors and nurses, though I was glad to have insurance again.
Labels: cancer, health, health insurance
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