• Lesson Plan
  • Lesson 1: Introduction to Health Insurance
  • Lesson 2: The Costs of Your Policy
  • Lesson 3: Choosing the Right Health Plan
  • Lesson 4: Things to Watch Out For
  • Lesson 5: Balancing Cost and Coverage
  • Lesson 6: All About Health Savings Accounts
  • Lesson 7: Start Comparing Plans
  • Lesson 8: How to Evaluate Insurers
  • Lesson 9: Get the Best Care Possible
  • Lesson 10: Final Summary

Lesson 10: Putting it All Together

Hopefully you have done as we suggested in previous lessons, and you've selected the right plan for yourself and/or your family or your business, and you're all set to enjoy the benefits of managed care under your new plan.

If you have not (bad you!), what are you waiting for?start comparing plans right now!

Let's run through the main points from the course to help you get started:

Types of health plans

There are two main types of health insurance plans that are available for purchase on the open market. These are indemnity plans, which are basically plans that cover care that you receive anywhere, but are much more expensive and managed care plans, which cost less but require you to obtain your care from a managed care network.

Managed care plans are further divided into different categories:

 HMO Plans - are the most pure network care plans, which cost the least on a monthly basis but often carry big expenses when seeking care out of the network

 PPO Plans - differ from HMOs chiefly in that a primary physician's referral is not required to see specialist, which greatly increases availability of certain treatments.

 POS Plans - which offer a blend of PPO and HMO features, by allowing you to pick a primary doctor but not offering much compensation for care services you obtain outside of the network.

Health Savings Accounts

Health savings accounts, which had been around for many years, became a viable option for millions of Americans due to major changes in the law enacted in 2005.

Basically, and HSA is like an IRA, but for your health.

The first thing to do if you want to benefit from a health savings account, is to find a an HSA-eligible plan your in your state, and see if you qualify.

Once your plan is in place, you can start contributing money to your HSA, which is tax-free money that can come either from a) your employer or b)yourself if you are self-employed and/or if you don't have any other kind of group health coverage.

HSA-eligible plans carry a high deductible, but this is offset by the fact that the entire amount of your deductible is tax free, so in essence, if you spend $2500 a year on health care, that is $2500 that you do not have to pay taxes on that year.

Evaluating companies

When you compare health plans, you're presented with a bewildering array of choices of insurers. How to know which ones are best?

In lesson 8 we offered an easy three-step approach to evaluating potential insurers (who will, after all, have a great say in the state of your health for years to come. So, yes, you should pay attention).

 Step one - get policyholder testimonials

 Step two - research plan accreditation

 Step three - find insurer financial ratings


We hope that you've found this introductory course helpful. If you know of anyone who might benefit from the info presented here, please pass it along by using the "share" link below.

To good health!