How to Buy Health Insurance Plans for Children at Different life Stages
Childbirth brings unfathomable joy and happiness in the life of parents. Indubitably, children are the apple of their parent’s eyes, and every parent wants to ensure that children get the best of everything. Apart from providing quality education to your children, as a parent, you also need to take care of your child’s health properly. Because of waning immunity and delicate features, newborns need proper health monitoring and timely vaccination to lead a wholesome life. From birth to teenage, every child needs special care and attention from their parents.
The experts also recommend that parents purchase a child mediclaim policy to help them adequately at different life stages. If you want to do strong financial planning for your child’s future, you should opt for a comprehensive health insurance policy. In India, the market is thronged with a spectrum of health insurance plans that can be scaled up so that your children get adequate coverage.
A parent should choose the right health insurance policy for their child that will cater to the needs of each life cycle.
- Prenatal coverage
- At birth
- Childhood to teenage phase
- Young Adults
1. Prenatal coverage
Couples planning for a family should look for maternity insurance coverage in their existing health insurance policies. This type of health insurance reimburses the costs of pregnancy and delivery-related hospitalization, diagnoses, and prenatal health care expenses, both for the mother and the baby. But before opting for such a policy, you must go through the policy terms and conditions for a list of congenital diseases that are not included.
Congenital diseases or genetic disorders are conditions that are present in the body at the time of birth. It is further characterized as external congenital such as extra skin formation, etc., and internal congenital such as weak heart since birth. Unfortunately, no health insurance company entertains medical insurance cover for congenital diseases in India. Even group health insurance policies also don’t offer congenital insurance coverage. But the proposer of the group may ask for congenital disease insurance coverage by paying some additional premiums.
Insurance policies do not normally cover In-vitro fertilization treatments (IVF). But many insurance companies are offering this as an add-on rider for additional premiums. There must be a sub-limit for this coverage. This will encourage couples who need special medical support in conceiving.
2. At birth
Always handpick an insurance plan that offers automatic coverage to newborn babies from day one. This means your child’s health is secured from birth. But these plans come with certain restrictions, including a cap on the sum insured, coverage for only a certain number of days from birth, and so on. You must consider a newborn baby cover that is usually applicable after 90 days from birth. But for this, you need to pay additional premiums and also intimate your insurer. Never assume that the newborn baby will be covered automatically or by default. Also, check whether the health plan takes care of newborn vaccinations and inoculations to safeguard your baby’s health from various diseases or not.
3. Childhood to teenage phase
This is the most crucial phase of your children’s life growth. This is the time when they may fall quarry to various communicable diseases and are susceptible to injuries/accidents while playing. So, you should purchase a health insurance policy plan that offers coverage under such medical contingencies. As a parent, you can stay relaxed as you don’t need to arrange funds to combat these situations. You should focus more on your child’s treatment so that he/she gets the best treatment and can resume normal activities quickly. Here, the minimum entry age for dependents is optimal. This means you can include your children early within your family floater plan. If you want to purchase a separate individual health insurance policy for your child, an early entry age could also be appreciable.
4. Young Adults
At this phase, your children become adults and start their careers. It is the ideal time when you should convert their family floater plan to an individual policy. An individual health policy will give them adequate coverage and a plethora of benefits. First, select a plan that offers the maximum age at the exit for dependents. Then, by comparing various plans, choose the best individual plan for the young adult.
It is always recommended to purchase a health insurance policy at the early stage of your child. Many plans offer coverage to your child from an early age. For example, family floater policies or comprehensive health care plans embrace your child with a plethora of benefits. Under such comprehensive policies, many value-added benefits like health risk assessments, critical illness coverage, etc., are covered.
Always purchase a policy for your child that offers coverage for inoculations and regular check-ups. Most available health insurance policies offer coverage at every stage of their growth. You can even customize or tailor-made these plans for a particular stage so that your child gets sufficient coverage. Choose a policy that offers critical illness treatment costs for your child.
While selecting a child health insurance plan, you must remember the below-mentioned things.
- Check the list of network hospitals/impaneled hospitals that are partnered with your health insurance company so that you can avail of cashless treatment for your children.
- Check whether the hospital has deft and professional pediatricians and child specialists. This will help you know what kind of treatment you will get in case of a healthcare contingency.
- Choose a policy with a higher sum insured. If you purchase a family floater health insurance policy with a higher sum insured, then it will cover higher hospitalization expenditures
Children have low immunity and subtle features. That’s why they need proper medical care and attention every time. So, as a parent, you should choose the best mediclaim policy for your children that gives them sufficient coverage and benefits.
