Private health insurance covering pregnancy?

[sonamay]

Hi, just recently I found out that apparently your private birth could be covered by a private health insurance. Is that true? Which insurance would do that and what are the main conditions? Do you have to start paying your premiums before you get pregnant? Thanks.

My DH has AXA through his work and its their highest level of insurance and it specifically says that pregnancy/birth is not covered unless there is a problem. Pregnancy in itself is not viewed as a medical problem (being a normal bodily function!) but if you have problems and need medical intervention, this could be covered. For example a friend needed an operation related to pregnancy and could have gone through her insurance apart from the fact that the operation couldn't be done in Scotland so she just went through the NHS. Also, i've had to see an osteopath for pregnancy related problems and that was covered. As far as i know, a 'normal' birth is not covered by insurance and certainly things like going to a private hospital or hiring a private midwife won't be. You would definitely need to have coverage before becoming pregnant - thats how insurance works!

With some of them you need to have cover for a certain time (normally 12 months) before you get pregnant. You should have a look around.

I think a lot of American insurance companies cover it (so expats over here would get covered for example). I had the highest level of insurance cover through work and although my pre-birth stay was covered (I had placenta praevia so was in hospital on bedrest) the actual delivery and postnatal stay on the ward wasn't.

Hope this helps.

I know my Dh's work insurance wouldn't cover it as we checked.

I think it would be strange for a UK company to cover it TBH. Normal pregnancy & birth isn't seen as a health issue at all, and as we have the NHS, going private is very much just a personal choice. Obviously it's different if you're in the US or are expat in the UK and may not be entitled to free-at-point-of-contact NHS anyway.

I have the highest level of bupa care and it will only cover private birth for certain complications - breech, ruptured membranes, pre-eclampsia, and some others which I don't remember. I asked Bupa if they would cover me due to complicated obstetric history and my issues were not on their list, they said no.

Hi Sonamay. I have BUPA international grade A cover and the entire thing is covered, physio, osteo, acupuncture, all scans, consultant led care throughout, midwife care, any additional check ups or scans that you want, birth, hospital stay etc etc. Haven't come across anything that isnt covered so far.

Think it is about £2250 a year but I get it through work (American parent company).

I'm not sure how long you have to have been covered before you become pregnant but I know that unlike most insurers, it doesn't matter if you had a previous condition prior to joining, all medical related expenses to do with this are still covered. ie my husband has psoriasis prior to joining but all his specialist appointments and light therapy are covered. I had recurring bronchitus and sinusitus but still, all appointments relating to it were covered.

Also, all dental and hygienist appointments are covered too.

In most cases the consultants or practitioners bill BUPA direct so I don't have to wait to claim back either which really helps. The first $10 which is usually about £6ish of every appointment is payable by me but I think this is very reasonable for the level of care I get and usually the surgery or practice just send me out an invoice for the remaining £6ish after they have the rest from Bupa.

Hope this helps.

This is my new pet subject! I had my son by c section (placenta previa) at the Portland. I transferred from NHS care at about 36 weeks and our insurer was Aviva, we had the enhanced/extended cover. Aviva were fantastic, they sorted out adding the baby to the policy, the bills (which were astronomic) for SCBU and paid everything including all my consultant fees. The total claim for the two of us was about £25k.

My husband's company, in their wisdom, have changed to AXA PPP and they SUCK. Their handbook says that the level of cover is the same, and they cover c section if medically required, but when you try to claim, they actually only pay your room fee and £600 for the surgeon. What kind of bloody surgeon would do a section for £600???! I'm having twins and this makes things even more complicated but the policy limit is "set in stone." We're battling with them at the moment, and my husband's company is trying to sort it out as they thought they'd got like-for-like cover when actually, it's woefully short.

Oh yeah, AXA have refused to cover ANY costs associated with the care of newborns who have been born of assisted conception because (and I quote) "They're born with more defects." So even if they donated their pissy £600 towards say, a delivery at the Portland, if the babies were ill, we'd have to send them to another hospital or stump up the £4k a night each that SCBU costs.

Sorry, this is a rant, but as you can tell, I'm in the middle of trying to sort this and am severely annoyed!

Don't bother with AXA, go to Aviva.

Gosh BofH. What happened to put you off the NHS? I have high level medical cover but have always chosen to have NHS treatment, especially where ds is concerned (born early and very poorly).

The NHS care he had saved his life and his ongoing medical care has been superb (all of which I could have accessed privately at no cost to me but frankly haven't seen the need). We have only gone private once to see a paediatric consultant orthapedic surgeon as there was no NHS surgeon in our PCT (same surgeon had resigned his NHS practice and a replacement hadn't been appointed).

£4k per night sounds high. Not sure what NHS SCBU costs but when ds was born NHS NICU was £1k per night.

MollieO, I'm a huge fan of the NHS! I've worked with them for almost 20 years and have unswerving respect for the work it does and what it stands for. But I'm aware of its shortcomings, especially in postnatal care. I knew I needed a section with my son, and didn't hear a SINGLE positive thing said about women's experiences postnatally after a section. And this has been even more the case with twins. My experience of my postnatal care privately was excellent. I was very well looked after, monitored, and cared for. If I pressed a button, someone always came quickly. I had a clean, private room and my own bathroom. I had access to plenty of painrelief, I was never in any pain, and my baby was cared for if I needed to sleep.
My friend who had her baby the same week, by c section, couldn't have any ward visitors apart from her husband, as the hospital had a problem virus they were trying to isolate. She was left for hours with a full bag and catheter in place. It was 7 hours before her wound was cleaned and dressed and she was on a drip and catheter overnight so couldn't reach her baby to feed her. No one came when she buzzed. And she was on a really noisy ward. She said the nurses were lovely, but just woefully stretched to the limit. I don't think her experience is uncommon at all.

As far as SCBU goes, this time I'm looking at units attached to NHS hospitals so that my babies would have access to NHS SCBU/NICU if required. I didn't think about it first time as we did expect our baby to end up there, but with twins, the chances of complications are much higher.

So in summary, for me the private cover is for the extra care after delivery, not for the delivery itself. It sounds ever so princessy on the face of it, but I've thought it through a lot and am trying to be realistic and make the best decisions for me and the babies, to give us the most positive experience at such an important and vulnerable time of our lives. Hope that explains!

Your friend's experience sounds awful so I can understand your concerns. Our local NHS hospital has private rooms within the NHS section which are apparently very nice and were about £200 a day (but needed to be booked in advance so not possible when ds decided to turn up early). I've heard from friends that the care was excellent - not needed by me as I had a normal delivery.

If I were you I'd look at NHS hospitals that also take babies under 30 weeks as they tend to have better NICU/SCBU. In a weird way I found it reassuring to know that the medical staff caring for ds were used to babies who were even more ill than him.

Needing help. My daughter is home form Canada - she returned to be with family to give birth. Although I checjked to see if she was covered before she came by NHS, we are now told she may not be. She and her partner are going to be here permanently in the future and we need to secure some insurance just in case anything goes wrong at the birth. There is now way the family can find the funds to pay for any medical emergencies. Does anyone have any good advice

Nanajen are you sure she's not covered by the NHS? Is she a UK or EU national?

You may want to try Aviva as others suggested, but I find it unlikely she would be eligible considering she's already pregnant. I wish you good luck with sorting this out!