Canadian Snowbirds and Health Insurance

You now have the knowledge of what it feels like to be a US citizen with no (or limited) health care coverage. Good luck on your efforts, if I was you, I would look for a warm place that had health care that was more in line with Canada's.

This is a problem many of us face. Some things to think about:

1) Check with the insurance carrier to what exactly the policy says about the 90 day pre-existing conditions. With ours (Sun Life), the pre-existing condition only applies to the specific ailment. For example, last year, my wife had pneumonia in November just before we were planning to head down to Arizona. We decided to risk going knowing that any lung problems would not be covered. Well we had not been down there for more than 2 weeks when my wife fell on a hike and broke her knee cap. We had to fly back to Canada for surgery. Although she did have a pre-existing lung problem, it did not affect her coverage for her knee.

2) Carefully assess the true risk of having another problem with the same condition that falls under the 90 day issue. If your feel that everything is fine and you are stable, consider going south anyway. Many do this.

3) If you have an issue as above, increase your monitoring and be prepared to return home immediately before complications start. For example, with my wife's lung problem last year, we purchased a blood oxygen reader that clipped on her finger. We routinely checked her O2 levels and were prepared to have her fly home at the first indication of a problem.

4) Make use of the urgent care centers for testing. You can have many tests done for reasonable cost (i.e. chest x-rays, blood testing, etc ... even an MRI). This can be a great help in monitoring your condition. Yes, it will cost you, but in my mind, it is worth it to get out of winter!! And at the first sign of a problem, head for home. Don't wait to see if it stabilizes or gets worse. Flights are cheap and you can always come back if it is not a serious problem.

It is all about risk assessment and management. Understand what your policy actually states about coverage and be aware of your condition and potential complications.

Good luck ....

Southern Spain!

I think here in BC we also have pre-existing conditions. The only insurer that would cover us was BCAA, and to that extent they cover the condition up to a limit. Their plan is to extricate you from the USA ASAP and back to your home province.

In Alberta perhaps you have a similar insurance plan. We went through and through many different insurers before someone suggested BCAA and without a doubt they are the best and most comprehensive.

There is a variety of plans available, and for us, we have comprehensive insurance through our credit card plan, 31 days for people under 65 and 7 days for over 65. That adds to a one month policy as often as we leave the province and gives us 37 days away.

PM me if I can help more.

Mike

I can only tell you to be very careful. Many of the plans including credit card and some insurance companies do not always cover you the way you think you are being covered. I know of many cases where people were denied coverage after the fact because they did not fill out the application form correctly. For example if you Doctor told you that you had borderline high blood pressure and he put that on your chart, then you filled out the form stating no to the appropriate question you would be denied.

I would suggest that you find an independent broker in your province who carries more than one companies insurance. They will guide you through the process.

Here in Manitoba we use an excellent broker from hotwinters.ca. You can look at their web site and use that as a guide to find someone in your own province perhaps.

Hope this helps....