Chicago Illinois Health Insurance Help

Reader’s Question:

I am getting my own health insurance before I go to post graduate school in Chicago. What are my choices?

Amanda

Chicago, IL

Plenty of choices for you, Amanda.

First of all, you have to consider the type of policy you would like to have for your health insurance in Chicago. Most major health insurance policies have a high deductible and a co-insurance with a lifetime maximum limit, which is usually at $1M or higher). To give you an idea of your coverage, most of policies of this type cover medical necessities such as doctor visits and hospitalization along with physical therapy, xray, outpatient surgery, and other medical procedures. Also, it can be offered with or without a PPO network provision, depending on your health insurance company.

Another type that you can check out are HMO policies. It really means Health Maintenance Organizations, with coverage that is close to that of a major health insurance policy. HMOs have co-payment obligations for you for the carious covered benefits. With this type, you can choose your primary care physician, also called PCP, from a list of network providers.

The last one is the PPO type of health insurance policy which really stands for Preferred Provider Organizations. It normally provides consumers with economic incentives if they contract to patronize a particular group of healthcare providers. A very common style for PPO is making you pay 80/20 if you go to a doctor that is in the network of providers.

But whatever the type is that you choose, there are normally exceptions for emergency care so you have to take a closer look at the policy for you to be aware beforehand of any extra costs for emergency cases.