Health Insurance / Healthcare Website and Blog

Medical insurance for international students is mandatory for foreign nationals studying at American universities. Universities provide guidelines about the illnesses or conditions that ought to be covered, a rough estimate of coverage amounts and premiums and maybe which insurer to approach.

Most insurers design international student insurance plans to suit the peculiar needs of students traveling outside their country. A medical maximum coverage of $200,000 or $300,000 per injury or illness is the norm; and universities expect students to cover themselves for at least as much.

In the event that the guidelines are not provided, then a careful analysis prior to purchase of the policy becomes necessary. An experienced insurance agent should be able to provide guidance and advise a student about how much the international students insurance plan should cover.

One way of doing it would be to get a state-specific list of the 25 most common procedures for where you plan to study. Many states in the USA are required to have one such published list. The list gives a fair estimate of the comprehensive costs for various procedures.

For example, you might have to part with as much as $5000-$8000 for just an overnight hospital stay, everything else extra. An actual procedure, for an appendectomy, would touch $18,000; heart surgery would cost five times as much.

These formidable costs make insurance doubly imperative, especially if traveling with spouse or partner. Maternity and childcare insurance will cover you for $200 doctor?s visits and $1000 ultrasound scans. If a c-section is indicated, buy extra coverage. Also remember that all policies do not cover post-natal complications.

An unmarried partner is not covered at all, pre or post-partum, but may be added to the list once married. Even then, post pregnancy complications would still not be covered. Do realize that covering your spouse in addition to yourself is expensive, but necessary.

A prudent course of action is to insure yourself for about $500,000; more, if you have a partner. Do this after a careful study of the international students insurance plan. Treatment by doctors and hospitals on the network will make direct billing possible; hence you will be saved considerable financial strain. However, with out-of-network hospitals, track every single operating and non-operating expense in order to make accurate claims.