US Expat, Medical Coverage

[Gesyca]

Can anyone understand me


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[PNGMK]

You buy a policy from Bupa, AXA or the like.

[Strong Eagle]

You can buy local medical insurance that covers you in Singapore only. There are quite a number of options available, including private room in a hospital, and size of deductibles.

This is the cheapest route but you must by medical coverage travel insurance if you are planning on leaving to visit another country as you will have no medical insurance elsewhere. Be sure to check the fine print on travel insurance for things like pre-existing conditions and whether or not it covers non-accident based claims... for example, a heart attack in Hanoi.

The next step up is to buy global health insurance that covers you all over the world, EXCEPT for the United States. This costs more than local insurance but is still quite cheap, but note that if you go to the USA for a visit, for example, you will not have any health insurance. As with most policies, you can choose deductibles, maternity coverage, vision, dental, etc, all of which affect your premium.

The next step up is to buy global health insurance that includes the United States. You will find this coverage to be limited and much more expensive than global health insurance without the USA in it. US insurance comes with several options, for example, the number of times you can visit, and the total length of time you can stay before your coverage expires. Four trips of two weeks each is pretty common in the policies I looked at. If you are planning on staying over a summer, you need to have insurance that covers you for the duration.

Finally, you can add on insurance riders. A common rider for all types of insurance is medical evacuation... if you are in the middle of no place, Laos, you will be taken to the nearest major medical center for treatment instead of having to get treatment in local hospitals.

And for insurance that includes the USA, you can purchase a catastrophic rider... should you get cancer or some other long term debilitating disease, you can come back to the USA for treatment over the long term... for a price, of course, and with lifetime caps.

It has been 5 years since I had expat insurance so my experiences are not current, and, I used GlobalHealth as my carrier. I opted for zero deductible insurance. They always paid, even when I had to make a major claim while in the USA>

[expatfamily18]

Most expat insurance plans that exclude USA , actually still provide upto 60 days visits to the US covered.

[Strong Eagle]

Most expat insurance plans that exclude USA , actually still provide upto 60 days visits to the US covered.

You should carefully check the fine print about that 60 days if you are an American. May not apply, in fact, while memory fades, I do remember Americans being excluded from that coverage. Even if you have USA coverage in most global plans, your health benefits are time limited.