Travel insurance for driving to Northern France at 32/33 weeks pregnant

[Jackieharris]

Hi,

There are some old threads on this. Seems like it might be a bit of a problem!

Anyone with experience of getting/not getting travel insurance under these circs?

I'm low risk (booked for home birth), this is dc3 so the chance of anything going wrong is extremely slim.

Atm it looks like I'll just be relying on e111 (or new name for it) form.

Anyone know much about French maternity services to know what'd happen if I did have a premature birth there? (Which seems to be the thing I'm insuring against.)

Thinking about all the possibilities- if I did have an emcs and counldnt drive home(DP doesn't drive) I suppose my dad would come and pick us up!!

But what if the baby ends up in special care for a few weeks? Do we just leave it and return when it's ready to be discharged?

Any experience of any of this or insurers that'll cover it without breaking the bank?

Tia

just relying on the EHIC is a BIG risk if you needed medevac. Bye-bye house if that happens. You'd better check what the French get under these situations, you'd get the same and would pay for anything they pay for.

you shouldn't go without travel insurance.

I don't want to (go without travel insurance) it just seems that most insurers won't provide it.

What is medevac?

What would a French national/citizen/resident get in terms of maternity care if they had a prem birth?

The worst case scenario is me having an emcs, having to stay in hospital for a few days/a week then not being able to drive home and having to leave baby in France until they are fit for discharge. At 32/33 weeks that would be 2-4weeks?

What would the insurance actually be paying for in this scenario?

a medevac is a medical evacuation - air ambulance. Not covered by EHIC.

2 mins on google gives this which should answer your questions.

www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/Healthcareabroad/countryguide/Pages/healthcareinFrance.aspx

note: ROUTINE maternity care.

what the insurance would pay for depends on the policy - if you can get one. Hopefully someone will be along with a recommendation. If you can't get one, that tells you something.

iIn my (admittedly limited) experience, ravenhall are the only ones who will insure both mother and unborn baby.

Thanks for the links.

One of them has something about patients paying for 20% of the costs of their health care. Is this what French women do if they have emcs & scbu? What kind of amount are we talking about? If it's a lot what do low income French women do?

I can't imagine we'd need a medevac. I'd surely be able to be driven home by family after a few days and I don't think I'd want a prem baby on a chopper for hours!

are your family happy to provide the insurance for you by driving to France and back?

if the baby is sick, it will be much safer on the air ambulance (usually a plane BTW) in the incubator with the doctors/nurses than in the back of a car. But as I said, if that happens - goodbye house and hello bankruptcy.

the odds on any of these things are small and naturally I hope they won't happen; but if they do, the consequences for you will be very big indeed.

Your nearest hospital would be Caen; the hospitals there are university hospitals and are very highly rated in France, which in turn is very highly rated in Europe. I find it hard to imagine any circumstances under which you would need to be evacuated!
French insurance is complicated, but in essence our primary medical insurers pay 70% and our top-up insurers 30%; however I am pretty sure that maternity is covered at 100%. You need to check carefully via the EHIC information, but I think you would be covered under the EU reciprocal agreement and I am sure that you would always get emergency treatment immediately. Medical care here is very good indeed.
It really wouldn't be difficult to get back. Brittany Ferries at Ouistreham is very close to St Aubin and to Caen and you can cruise back on a big comfortable boat and get off in Portsmouth.
The only difference I know in maternity care is that everyone round here goes in for at least six days to have a good rest.

Thanks I'll do some more research.

I looked into this 4 years ago when pregnant with DS1 and couldn't seem to find anything, everywhere I rang didn't seem to offer any kind of specific insurance but maybe I was talking to the wrong people.

I was low risk booked for a homebirth so in the end I just went and relied on EHIC if the worst should have happened. I did it again 2 years later and will be doing it again this summer (all will have been between 31 and 33 weeks).

I was more confident doing this because I was going to stay with my French family plus my parents were there too so in the worst case scenario I would have had lots of support and a place to stay for as long as I needed.