While a lot can go into choosing a health plan, these five quick check points are a good starting place. When you're comparing health plans, look for useful tools and services that may come at no additional cost and help you save time and money, and support your health. All insurance policies and group benefit plans contain exclusions and limitations. For availability, costs and complete details of coverage, contact a licensed agent or Cigna sales representative. This website is not intended for residents of New Mexico.
Selecting these links will take you away from Cigna. Cigna may not control the content or links of non-Cigna websites. For the best experience on Cigna. Overview Medicare Coverage Options. Broker Resources. Getting care from a person or place your plan covers saves you money. On the other hand, getting care somewhere else may mean your health plan pays less, leaving you with bigger bills. Waking up with a sore throat or sinus infection is never fun.
When it happens, you want to feel better and find care — fast. Everyone gets sick from time to time, so before it happens, consider how easy your plan makes it to find covered care. Remember: health care is health care. Different health plans treat alternative therapies alternative medicine different ways.
Due to the restrictions, however, HMOs tend to be the cheapest type of health plan, overall. If you do choose a POS plan and go out of network, make sure to get the referral from your doctor ahead of time to reduce out-of-pocket costs. An EPO may help keep costs low as long as you find providers in network; this is more likely to be the case in a larger metro area.
A PPO might be better if you live in a remote or rural area with limited access to doctors and care, as you may be forced to go out of the network. They are the only plans that qualify you to open an HSA, which is a tax-advantaged account you can use to pay health care costs. Costs are lower when you go to an in-network doctor because insurance companies contract lower rates with in-network providers.
You can also directly ask your doctors if they take a particular health plan. Out-of-pocket costs are nearly as important as the network. The federal marketplace website offers snapshots of these costs for comparison, as do many state marketplaces. As the consumer, your portion of costs consists of the deductible, copayments and coinsurance. The total you can spend out of pocket in a year is limited, and that out-of-pocket maximum is also listed in your plan information.
In general, the lower your premium, the higher your out-of-pocket costs. Your goal during this step is to narrow down choices based on out-of-pocket costs.
A plan that pays a higher portion of your medical costs, but has higher monthly premiums, may be better if:. By now, you likely have your options narrowed to just a few. To further winnow down, go back to that summary of benefits to see if any of the plans cover a wider scope of services. Some may have better coverage for things like physical therapy, fertility treatments or mental health care, while others might have better emergency coverage. Write your questions down ahead of time, and have a pen or computer handy to record the answers.
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