Dylan Geraci, President of KMG Insurance Solutions, was interviewed by WINK News for his expertise in managing elective surgeries during COVID pandemic.
Health insurance costs surpass $20,000 per year, hitting a record. "It's as much as buying a basic economy car," said Drew Altman, chief executive officer of the Kaiser Family Foundation, "but buying it every year." Know all your options!
I am an independent health insurance advisor. I can and will present all your health insurance options to you.......together we'll work at keeping your health insurance premiums as affordable as possible while protecting your family against high medical bills. If your health insurance agent is not an independent agent how do you know you are being told all your options? Know that some insurance companies requite agents to be exclusive to them so their agents only sell one insurance company’s products. The “free market” only works when there are options and competition. There is no once size fits all health insurance plan. Family’s needs and income fluctuate year to year and your health insurance coverage needs to change and reflect your current needs and budget. Work with an independent health insurance advisor.
Read entire article.
First: Always ask for a price.
Second: Your bills are negotiable.
A great health insurance agent will help you negotiate your high medical bills. Ironically the federal government has a mandatory disclosure rule for real out of pocket costs people incur at a vulnerable time in their lives, but its not a rule for health care – it’s for funeral homes. The Funeral Rule requires funeral providers to offer itemized pricing information to consumers before they purchase any services. The rationale is that consumers in distressing situation should have honest pricing information, a rule that should also apply to the living, not just the dead. The government won’t protect you from predatory billing when you are sick and vulnerable, but this health insurance agent will. Make sure your health insurance agent is also a health insurance advisor that can help you not only with your insurance but also with your medical care costs. (
Read more)
Sutter Health is the only Hospital System that is ripping off the public!!! Hospital systems across the country have embarked on a deliberate strategy to gain market power in certain geographic areas through a campaign of mergers and acquisitions. Hospitals across the country routinely overcharge and predatory bill patients because they can. If you are in a high deductible health plan you will be responsible for these charges. Even if you are in a low deductible plan you ultimately pay for these high charges and billing errors the next year in year via higher insurance premiums. A great health insurance agent will help you decipher your medical bills and give you the tools, knowledge, and power to negotiate them. The insurance market and medical care industry is not a level playing field for individuals and employees. Most everyone needs a health insurance advisor to be an advocate for them year-round. A lot of health insurance agents and brokers only work the last 3 months of the year. I work year young helping my clients whenever I am needed, not just when it is time to make commissions.
Read article.
Unfortunately far too many people purchase health insurance that ends up leaving them at risk. Rule #1: Never buy a fixed benefit/indemnity plan that is pitched to you as a $0 deductible plan.
Read more...Health Insurance for all is unfeasible until Medical Care costs come down. The US should do nationally what the state of Montana did (watch the video). Inside of two years Montana went from projecting a $9 million-dollar deficit to a more than $100 million surplus. How? They were able to cut out the greed, rot, and corruption. Can that be done on a national scale?? Absolutely, but the insurance and pharmaceutical industry hold too much sway in DC. Far too many people profit from it. The fact is that if the system would stay where it's at - broken - too many people profit and the profit, not in thousands of dollars, but in millions upon millions of dollars. That's why it's so hard to fix.
Read more...New health insurance designs mean you’ll be paying more of the costs out of pocket. This trend is only going to get worse.
Buy supplemental insurance policies that plug the holes in your base medical plan. It is sooooooo much easier to come up with $10/week for great supplemental policies than to come up with $3,500, $5,000, $7,900 at one moment after a bad sickenss or accident.
Far too many people are underinsured. Underinsured is defined by those whose out-of-pocket costs or deductible comprise 5-10% of their income. These individuals find it more difficult to cover their medical bills, which can often turn into debt.
And both individuals who are insured through their employers or on their own are affected. The survey found that the number of underinsured Americans insured by their employers jumped from 17% in 2010 to 28% last year, while it has increased from 37% to 42% in the individual insurance market.
Read more...12-month medical plans fill a very needy void in the health insurance market. It gives consumers another choice. 56% of counties in the U.S. had only one insurer to choose from in the individual market.
This article was released by the Mississippi Center for Public Policy, but is relevant to Florida residents.
"These short-term plans are much cheaper for consumers, but lack some of the mandated coverages that are part of the policies sold under the exchanges set up by the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. This means these plans can be better tailor-fit to a consumer’s need than the several sizes fit-all types offered by the exchanges."
Read more...Question: How does the radiation in a CT ('CAT') scan compare to the radiation in an X-ray?
Answer: A CT scan has about 500 times as much as an x-ray.
Most have between 100 and 1000 times as much radiation. I am not suggesting: 'Never get a CT scan.' I am just saying: 'Make sure to consider the risks and discuss them with your doctor.' This is especially true for your children.
"When the Food and Drug Administration approved magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanners in 1984, the machines seemed incredible. They offered an inside view of the human body, making it easier to diagnose disease, injuries and physical abnormalities. Today, they’re part of a multibillion-dollar industry: In 2016, 118 out of every 1,000 Americans got an MRI. The use of CT scans was even higher: 245 per 1,000 people in 2016.
But was all of that testing actually necessary?
No way, say physicians from the Mayo Clinic and Stanford University. In a viewpoint article in JAMA, they argue that it’s time to put the brakes on unnecessary and wasted diagnostic imaging.
“There is virtually no evidence that screening of this kind improves overall population health,” write Ohad Oren, Electron Kebebew and John P.A. Ioannidis. But, they admit, it will take a lot to wean Americans off their addiction to medical imaging."
Read more...
