Posted on 09/07/2020 3:54:45 AM PDT by Kaslin
Your house should be your most expensive purchase, so the saying goes. Not these days. Today, health care costs make most mortgages look like loose change on the sidewalk. Your home or your vacation or your children’s future should be where your money goes—not to some plastic card in your wallet.
Here’s how I threw away that expensive piece of plastic and kept my money for the things I want to spend it on.
I opened my own medical practice five years ago, after resigning from my position as a physician at a hospital. Resigning meant I lost my health insurance. So, I set out to navigate the individual market. My jaw dropped when I saw the $26,000 premium for health insurance for my family of four. That’s a new car every year, I thought, except I don’t get to drive anything. Instead, I get the dubious honor of carrying a gold plan PPO card in my wallet.
As I digested that first quote of $26,000, I recognized that was the cost even before any care would be provided. Even as a I earned a physician’s salary, I cringed.
So, I looked for a way to find quality coverage, great care, and better savings. I discovered health-sharing ministries. These forms of non-insurance health care coverage are based on the Christian principles of sharing each other’s burdens. At first glance, it’s not the insurance we’re accustomed to: members share each other’s medical expenses by sending monthly “shares” directly to fellow plan participants who are sick. This bypasses the costly insurance company bureaucracy and allows health sharing ministries to provide great coverage with less intrusion at less cost.
After my wife and I looked through several sharing ministries, we chose Samaritan Ministries. At first, we felt odd sending our monthly shares (think “premiums”) directly to another person instead of to an insurance company. But we quickly saw that sending our money to people in need, rather than a faceless insurance company lining its bottom line, provided unanticipated value that went beyond our budget. Acknowledgements arrived in our mail from people receiving the help. What insurance company sends a “thank you” for receiving my premium? Our children joined in, writing “get well” messages to send with our shares, helping them learn the value of giving.
With our coverage now arranged through Samaritan Ministries, we turned to looking for medical care at a good price. As a direct primary care (DPC) physician, I knew this new membership model could cut costs. For a low monthly rate, DPC doctors see patients as much as they need without copayments. Many DPC doctors also have significantly discounted labs, meds, and imaging services, which are frequently less expensive than insurance-based copayments. This makes finding quality care more affordable and less entrenched in fear of being punished with an exorbitant bill from fee-for-service care. DPC is personal, affordable, and predictable
This combining of the cost-effective care found in DPC with the cost-effective coverage of health sharing meant the best of both worlds for my family and me. For $730 a month, my entire family was covered for catastrophic care, and we had unlimited primary care physician visits (with discounted labs, meds, and imaging).
This is dramatically less than the monthly $2,170 I would have paid for the traditional insurance premium alone before I even saw a physician. That translated to a savings of $172,800 per decade, or the equivalent of buying a new house—with cash—every 10 years.
So, what of all those savings I’ve had in healthcare? Well, I can say it has a great living room.
Looking forward to getting more information about this. Thanks for posting
I know people who pay far more in property taxes than their sky high health insurance premiums...
Health shares have been around for a long time. Amish and Mennonites for starters.
I am in a Catholic health sharing that is $259 a month for coverage for me.
We really need to kill off the current insurance model. Everyone knows it’s BS, but no one’s willing to change it.
I don’t understand why I need to work for a big company to get “cheap” insurance coverage. I get that rate because the company negotiated it on my behalf, and then covers some of my costs - but - why can’t a family like the one in the article get the same rate?
Add to that the doctors billing 2 to 10x the cost of a procedure, then accepting the 1x payment from insurance.
It’s a complicated problem that most people can’t actually solve, but it’s gotta change. Most 9-to-5ers are locked into their current work model solely because of insurance. I’d have gone freelance / contract many years ago otherwise.
Back when the kids were home we paid $2,400 a month in health insurance.
Our tax bill for the house this year (higher) is $3,600 for 6 months.
I know people who are paying ten grand and more annually on existing homes over two hundred grand.
I don’t know, but that sounds a lot to me
You must have employer provided free insurance? $259/month is nothing.
Study
No my husband and I are on Tricare and medicare, we are both senior citizen. I guess I didn’t understand the whole thing.
bookmark
Nebraska here, 7K for a 250K home in property taxes.
‘... health-sharing ministries.”
Read the fine print. Some of these ministries will drop you like a brick if they discover that you drink alcohol or smoke.
bmp
“Looking forward to getting more information about this. Thanks for posting”
We have been members of this group for five years. Excellent service.
https://www.chministries.org
Well TriCare is the best insurance in the country. Thank you and your husband for your service.
That is true, no smoking. No smoking weed. No vaping. Because it is bad for your health. You can drink alcohol.
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