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Psychiatric care in health insurance

chibamSenior Contributor29 Mar 2016, 5:11 am AEDT

Psychiatric care in health insurance

Like a lot of people, my old man has gotten riled up recently about the rising cost of health insurance. So I spent most of yesterday morning helping him navigate the internet in search of better providers and all the various forms of coverage out there.

At one point we came upon a "pick and choose your own coverage" website. My dad started nominating the coverages he wasn't interested in, and as he came to hospital psychiatric services, he dismissed the coverage as if it were as useless to him as obstetrics. After this, I started paying more attention to what we were perusing, and I began to notice that barely anybody out these seems to offer significant psychiatric coverage, at least not by default.

I can help but assume that my dad's is the mainstream viewpoint out there: "Oh! I'm never going to get mentally ill! I don't need to be covered for it!" So barely anybody gets covered for it. But then you hear about how mental illness can pretty much strike anyone at any time, and I can't help but wonder if there isn't a major problem here: where maybe people are getting financially crushed by surprise mental illnesses, whereas they wouldn't be so bad off if they got cancer or had a heart attack because those are things their covered for.

Is this something that maybe needs more awareness? That maybe people would be prudent to prepare for an unexpected breakdown of their mind the same way they prepare for unexpected breakdowns of their bodies?

As much as I'm not a fan of the mental health system, I don't like the idea of people winding up bankrupt when they come to the conclusion that they need their services.

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In response to: Psychiatric care in health insurance

BlueBaySenior Contributor29 Mar 2016, 12:10 pm AEDT

Re: Psychiatric care in health insurance

Hi @chibam

I agree that there needs to be more coverage for psychiatric care. My first year of seeing a psychologist and a psych, as well as the odd remedial massage to help with my depression/anxiety cost me $12,000. I was completely shocked to see how much I had paid in that one financial year. And I was working as well as my husband with 3 children. We struggled to find the money each week, but I somehow managed. But then again I don't know where I would be now if I hadn't seen someone.

At the time I didn't have psychiatric cover but soon afterwards I changed my cover and upped it. The cost is ridiculously high but I look at it that it is helping my mental health. By me going to see a professional and at times been admitted to a mental health unit in a private hospital for a break. Without my extra cover I wouldn't have been able to do that and I guess I would have just 'floated' around in the public system.

You just never know when a mental illness can strike you. It took me by surprise and shock. And five years later i am still working through my illness.

There needs to be more cover on mental illness because at the moment there isn't enough.

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