Health plans provide financial assistance to help people get the required treatment. Since inflation has driven up the cost of basic hospitalisation, depleting the policyholders’ financial savings, health insurance plans provide cash coverage for basic medical needs and ensure that policyholders get quality care in emergency situations.
However, certain medical procedures, such as treating a serious illness, are expensive and require high compensation that may not be provided by a basic health insurance policy. Therefore, to assist policyholders in such situations, health policy providers like Tata AIG have introduced critical illness health insurance plans. This plan includes a list of chronic conditions such as cancer, diabetes, and stroke.
The critical illness insurance plan provides coverage for a list of serious illnesses. Under this coverage, the insured receives a one-time payment from the plan to cover medical expenses as well as lost income in connection with treatment.
Certain serious illnesses, such as multiple sclerosis, severely affect large parts of the population due to lifestyle changes. Multiple sclerosis disturbs the normal functioning of the brain and hampers one’s daily life.
This is the reason why it is essential to have a robust health insurance policy that covers such critical health problems in question. This informative blog discusses whether or not health insurance policies cover multiple sclerosis. But first, let’s understand what multiple sclerosis actually is.
What is Multiple Sclerosis?
Multiple sclerosis is a progressive neurological disease that disturbs the central nervous system (CNS) of the human brain. In multiple sclerosis, nerve fibres are protected by myelin, a coat of fatty tissues. The human body’s immune system attacks myelin, which disturbs nerve cells and causes scarring of tissues and inflammation called sclerosis.
This makes communication between the brain and body difficult and ultimately damages neurological connections. It functions as an autoimmune disease and has a high probability of recurrence after diagnosis.
How to Treat Multiple Sclerosis?
Before starting the treatment for multiple sclerosis, your doctor would first recommend a few tests that would include blood tests, MRI scans, and so on. However, this disease isn’t fully curable. The treatment for multiple sclerosis majorly focuses on speeding up the recovery process from attacks and slowing the progression of the ailment while managing its symptoms.
Some people may have just mild symptoms of multiple sclerosis which would need no treatment at all. However, the ones who experience severe attacks of the disease may need to take steroids. Doctors may prescribe corticosteroids like oral prednisone or intravenous methylprednisolone to reduce nerve inflammation.
In some cases, the doctors may prescribe plasma exchange or plasmapheresis. Here, the plasma is separated from the blood cells of the patients. Those cells are then mixed with albumin (a protein solution) and injected back to the body. This treatment is majorly done to the ones who do not respond to the steroids.
Do Health Insurance Plans Cover Multiple Sclerosis?
Yes, there are many health insurance providers that include multiple sclerosis in their critical illness health plan. Therefore, it is important for insurers to read the insurance document carefully when choosing health insurance plans to ensure that the insurance company covers the necessary ailment or disease.
Should You Be Purchasing a Critical Illness Insurance Plan for Treatment of Multiple Sclerosis?
If you are looking for adequate coverage for multiple sclerosis, you should invest in an appropriate critical illness insurance plan as it is different from regular medical insurance plans. The lump sum amount under the plan is provided to the insured on a one-time basis after diagnosis, allowing the insured to pay for medical expenses or to compensate for lost income from treatment.
Illnesses like multiple sclerosis are life-threatening and require multiple treatments, resulting in high health care expenses that can drain your financial savings. Your critical health insurance plans contain a list of chronic diseases, so you should check if multiple sclerosis is one of them. Most critical illness insurance plans cover all medical expenses including medicine, hospitalisation, room rental, and ambulance.
The critical illness plan provides coverage to policyholders for financial expenses incurred due to the treatment of critical diseases as mentioned in the policy and the plan encompasses a range of critical illnesses. When purchasing a critical illness plan ensure that you multiple sclerosis is included in the list.
Conclusion
It is disheartening to get diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Multiple sclerosis dominates the population as a chronic disease that, if left untreated, can hamper any part of the body. Therefore, people with multiple sclerosis need immediate medical attention, which may burn a hole in the insured’s pocket. Critical illness plan provides comprehensive support to manage the high costs of treating your disease, including costs for diagnostic tests, room rental, and medications and is any day a better choice over regular medical insurance plans.
