Private Health insurance yes or no?!

[LiveLifeToTheFull2]

I'm debating whether to cover me and my husband and young son with private health insurance.

Can anyone share their thoughts on whether you have it and think it's beneficial or a waste of money please?

Also how does it actually work?
So say you have a pain or symptom that needs an endoscopy for example do you have to go through tour GP or do you go straight to your insurance?
Does your GP have to do anything?

Because my main issue right now is trying to get your GP to do anything is like getting blood out of a stone, you have to jump through so many hoops to get a scan or referral it's quite worrying 🥴

We have BUPA through DH's work.

We are able to self-refer for DH and I, so we can bypass our GP.

However, we have always needed a referral for our DC, we can't self-refer them. But the referral can come from seeing a BUPA GP online, I think.

But it might all depend on the policy and level of cover that you choose. Also watch for whether pre-existing conditions are covered or not.

Had Bupa through DH work, it was fab.

Self refer for some issues, others you need an on-line consult through their own GP, but always got a slot within the hour!

DH had lots of physio, specialist support for Lyme, and many scans for joint and disc issues. He has really had his money's worth.

I have had endoscopys for stomach issues, an ovarian cyst removal, and skin biopsies.

Good for the DC's too. We accessed mental health support, and peads to investigate CF after glandular fever.

You get a much better range of blood tests too, on the day, full panels, and results next day. They tend to be more thorough all in one go, which saves time.

Caveat is, now retired and can't afford the premiums....... Back to the real world for us.

We are all covered through my work. Used to need a GP referral but that changed years ago. You can self refer for somethings, pre authorised for others and some you need a GP referral but that can be done by the online GP service and I can get an appointment within hours.

I've got Vitality through work. I had some gynae issues in 2022. A GP referral in October 2022 kept getting pushed back and I still hadn't seen anyone for an initial consultation in July 2023 at which point I cancelled in.

With Vitality in November 2022 I picked a private consultant, had an appointment in a week, a scan the following week, a follow up with the consultant the week after that and surgery booked in January 2023. I could've had the surgery in December but decided I didn't want to be recovering over Christmas.

It turned out to be stage 4 endometriosis with an 8cm cyst on one ovary that could've burst at any time. Had that happened it would've been emergency surgery on the NHS, probably not keyhole and most likely the loss of an ovary as well. I am so so grateful that I could go private and have already confirmed with Vitality that they will cover my endo if my work policy ends and I need to take out an individual one.

Without a doubt, if you can afford it.

Quicker appointments with better diagnosis (Still haven't figured how the NHS missed a dislocated collarbone - Twice!).

If you're unfortunate enough to need inpatient care for whatever, private room with unbelievable after care, spotlessly clean environment, none of the beep, beep, beeps of other monitors constantly... I could go on, but really it's chalk and cheese.

If you’re paying yourself I’d say in general overall it’s not worth it for kids if your kids are healthy and likely only to need rare and minor things- general paediatric services are much of a muchness. We have it through my husbands work though and my dd has an ongoing issue that needed a specialist and quite a few tests etc and we were able to get done in a few months what would have taken a lifetime without our insurance.

We have it, it's totally worth it in my opinion if you can afford to.

My son has just been seen by a consultant in December, diagnosed with a severe dust mite allergy. He started a three year immunotherapy course which is eye watering expensive!

The last prescription was £450 for three months worth of tablets 🫠 but AXA pays it directly to them.

Do you have pre-existing conditions? If so they won't be covered. Workplace ones tend to smd so are much better value. What do you actually want it for? Some people would be better off saving the premium and then using that to pay if they need to see a specialist etc instead.

We have a family group health insurance but change insurer regularly. We don't bother with gp's as all I'd ever want from them is a letter of referral, and dh just tells Bupa we've seen one.

If I suspected anything were seriously wrong with me or my family i have the peace of mind knowing I can have every test under the sun immediately, harassing a top consultant's secretary for an urgent appointment.

Last year health insurance saved my mum's life.. after her first symptom she saw a consultant within days who gave her a colonoscopy and bowel cancer was diagnosed. It was caught at stage 1 and she's fine.. if she'd had to wait for an nhs appointment I know the outcome would have been very different.

If you can afford if then 100% get it. If I were to add up the cost of the procedures and investigations we have used it for as a family we have far more benefit back than the cost of the premiums. Also it ensures you always see the consultant from start to finish of your treatment so they know exactly what's going on whereas relying on NHS you just see a member of the surgical team that may/may not be up to speed on your case. It puts it into perspective when DH is an NHS consultant whose average patient wait for an initial appointment is nearly 10 months yet for the same speciality you would definitely get a private appointment within 10 days.

I love our health insurance. We get everything checked within about a week by a top consultant including all necessary scans and procedures. Ours has a digital GP included and like a PP you can always get an appointment within an hour and they'll refer you at the drop of a hat. Before digital GPs were a thing I've always found various GPs more than willing to refer me the moment I mention I have private health insurance.

Some things you don't need a referral at all, often for things like physio and potential cancer stuff like breast lumps or blood in your poo.

Watch out @ohthejoys21 with telling them you have a referral as they do spot check and a colleague recently had to pay over £1k because the Insurer refused to cover her claim because she had lied that she had a referral.

Yes 100% recommend I've had vitality and AXA in the past

Vitality again now and only ever used vitality in practice.

We do get it via work but pay for my dependents (dh and dc)

Access to a GP virtually within 1-2 days who can onward refer you for a consultant or send you a prescription or recommend initial diagnostic tests and vitality pay upto a limit for these via their gp. Full cover and no shortfalls on your onward approved consultant care,

I would grudge paying it myself a wee bit if not a benefit via work as can get very expensive however I wouldn't be without it now!

If you can afford it yes, go for it. Sometimes you need to get a referral from GP. Our’s is always relieved that we don’t want the NHS. But with WPA we can get an online referral via their GP. Remember they don’t cover you for chronic illnesses but do cover for cancer. DH has used it loads over the years and I am currently having physio. Some people say they simply save the money and pay for operations as needed but mostly they have no idea as to how it all adds up.

Alot if people aren’t paying monthly payments, but paying for private gp appointments as and when needed. Maybe worth considering, especially for children.

We’ve had medical insurance for over 28 years through AXA, some conditions you can self refer, others need to be through GP, but AXA have their own GP phone service. In those years DS2 has had 3 knee operations costing £15,000, DH has had a knee operation £2,500 and an eye operation £1,000 and then in 2020 spent 10 days in hospital after a triple heart bypass, never given the cost, but presume somewhere £25,000. So we’ve had our premiums worth, although now it’s about £4,000 per year and we’ve changed plans since.

We have BUPA and have used the GP virtual service with a referral to consultants. It’s super easy to use and so much faster than the NHS. I know someone who never uses their NHS GP always goes to the private GP nowdays for the whole family.

For piece of mind I love it, we have £100 copay per year per person (only if you use a consultant) the GP service isn’t included.

I think it’s worth it but check all the payment terms / what’s included what isn’t and any excesses.

If I could afford it I would absolutely.

I have several health issues and sitting on long waiting lists for treatment is miserable.

I have just discovered that I have endometriosis. I paid privately to see a consultant, the hospital want £7400 for a laparoscopy. I can’t afford that so have to wait over a year now for the procedure on the NHS. If I had private health insurance I’d have had the procedure by now but instead am in pain every day.

If you can afford it definitely go for it, you never know when it will help you especially the state of our NHS waiting times.