In the past few years, an ever-increasing number of people in India have started to purchase health insurance plans to protect themselves against the rapidly rising healthcare costs.
Treatment at private hospitals has become so expensive that any prolonged disease or serious illness can wipe out a family’s savings in just a few weeks.
Insurance companies have also started to offer a variety of health insurance plans aimed at different demographics.
A family health insurance plan (family floater policy) allows individuals to add their family members under a combined health insurance policy, where the whole family shares the coverage under the plan.
Choosing health insurance plans for your family is a more appropriate choice if you have a spouse and young kids.
Since the likelihood of your kids and spouse failing seriously ill at the same time or in the same year is quite low, the shared coverage for family floater plans is utilised efficiently in this situation.
However, your elderly parents are more likely to get sick at the same time or in the same year.
If you and both your elderly parents fall sick in the same year, the coverage under the family floater plan may not be enough to take care of all your expenses.
Moreover, if there are multiple health insurance claims on your family floater plan, the premiums for your plan will keep on increasing.
So, experts recommend that you should get individual health plans for your elderly parents.
Why Should You Consider Separate Health Plan for Your Parents?
When you buy individual health plans for your elderly parents, you should choose a policy based on their specific needs.
If one of your parents suffers from health issues, you can buy a plan that offers a higher sum insured along with any applicable add-on riders.
Moreover, you can also buy the senior citizen’s health insurance plan for your parents which are specifically aimed at older individuals.
This will allow you to provide your parents with the individual coverage they need.
Moreover, you will save money on insurance costs in the long run. So, having separate health plans for you and your parents is the correct choice.
Things to Consider When Buying Health Insurance for Parents
As your parents grow older, they will need more and more medical attention. You need to consider all of their healthcare requirements.
Here are some important factors you need to take into account when buying health insurance for your parents:
1. Sum Insured
The most important factor you need to consider is how much sum insured or coverage your parents will individually need. Since the elderly are more prone to fall sick, you should consider getting a health plan with higher coverage. If you wish to increase their sum insured in the future, you could also consider getting top-up health insurance for your parents.
2. Waiting Periods
If your parents have any pre-existing conditions that may need treatment in the future, you should specifically look for health plans that have the lowest waiting periods. This will allow your parents to get the care they deserve as soon as possible.
3. Inclusions and Exclusions
Most importantly, you should carefully look at which diseases and medical conditions are covered under their health policy and which are not. If a particular health plan does not include coverage for a disease that your parents suffer from, you should choose a different insurance provider that does provide coverage for it.
To Conclude
As people get older, their healthcare needs also grow. If you wish to take care of your parents, you should ideally get individual insurance plans for them with the appropriate sum insured and add-on covers.
You can also get senior citizens’ health insurance if your parents are above the age of 60, but make sure you read and understand the policy details before buying any plan.
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