Health Insurance while in PA School

[DejaBlu]

Good afternoon,

 

This may be a bit premature, but I'm wondering about student health insurance while attending PA school.  If/when most of us are accepted, I'm sure there will be several of us that will need to quit our jobs which will leave us without insurance.

 

Does anyone have any good advice about how to afford health insurance, including dental and vision?  I know some schools offer insurance but beyond that, what are the options?  Recommended plans?  Etc.?

 

Thanks!

[kb1988]

I've been wondering this as well.

[loliz]

Most schools offer insurance, especially if it is a graduate level program. Otherwise, you can buy insurance on your own like the millions of other americans that don't get it from their employers. Or you can cross your fingers that you don't get sick, but your school will likely frown on this and you may end up with govt fees as well.

 

As for how to afford this-- the same way you will afford everything in PA school! For many people this means loans and for other people it means that their parents will pay it. As my health insurance and tuition costs went up every semester, my loans stayed the same. 

 

But first things first… get into PA school! Focus on that, the rest will fall into place and your budgeting skills will be tested along the way :)

[BeatlesLVR]

great planning and thinking ahead @Dejablu.  I know that each school offers a student insurance program that students can apply and pay for.  This is a totally different program, but my fiancé at the time was enrolled in an MBA program at Univ of California, Irvine and he was REQUIRED to have insurance prior to being able to enroll in any classes.  Since we were not married at that time, UCI offered him admission into their AETNA student insurance program, the cost of which they rolled into his tuition (~$1,500/yr or less).  The following year we were married and he dropped AETNA and enrolled under my insurance, BCBS Federal.  

 

So, if you are married you have the opportunity to be rolled under your spouses' insurance pgm.  If you're not married, then you have the ability to purchase the student insurance offered by the school. 

[Johnson2018pac]

I just started PA school so I recently had to deal with this as well. Myself and many of my classmates purchased the university health insurance. It was much better coverage for the price of any of the obamacare plans I could find out there. Everyone else had their insurance through their spouses or parents which is fine too, the school emphasized that the plans needed to cover blood born pathogen exposure tho in case you had a needle stick or any other accident.

[gbrothers98]

If under 26 can be on parents plan.

If a veteran, can register with the VA.

If neither is an option, check out state exchange.

Since you will be without income, you may qualify for state medicaid. If not, speak with a navigator, you likely will get a large enough subsidy to make it affordable.

Always speak with an exchange navigator when you are using the ACA exchanges.

There is also the school option, which dependent upon the school and location can be robust or poor.

All programs will require you to provide proof of insurance for enrollment.

GB PA-C

[MT2PA]

Personally this was something I paid attention to for each school I applied to and interviewed with. I didn't want to go the obamacare route so I only considered schools that offered health insurance as I will lose mine when I quit my job and those will be my only options.

[SHU-CH]

Pretty much all schools will offer some kind of bare bones plan that will cover major issues. Minor stuff you can generally have treated in the student health center relatively inexpensively.

 

This is not something you want to mess around with. I got tossed off my parent's insurance in the middle of PA school and bought the school policy in December. January 25 I had my appendix out. It would have set me back about $15,000 without the policy.