A medical insurance plan is a contract between a health insurance provider and an individual which promises various benefits in exchange for certain considerations.
Such a contract is regarded to be unilateral because only one party which is the insurance provider is required to meet his obligation.
Basically, the individual or the business that is holding the policy may to stop making payments for the policy which is known as premium even before the contract is expired.
However, the insurer must meet his duty as long as he is receiving his monthly premium under the contract.
Medical insurance plans can provide a combination of benefits or just a single benefit to the policy holder.
Benefits can include: - Hospital expenses arising out of an accident or sickness - Dismemberment or accident death - Disability caused due to an accident or sickness Medical insurance plans are designed to provide the insured protection against economic losses such as loss of earnings and expenses that was paid for medical care.
The two main types of medical insurance plans include: - medical expense plans - disability income plans The type of coverage offered under medical expense plan varies greatly.
They are available from minimal cover to comprehensive packages.
They can also cover a wide variety of events.
There are certain plans which cover for accidents and sicknesses, hospital expenses and medical care costs.
Some of the different types of plans under this category include: - sickness and accident plans - hospital plans - major medical expense plans - comprehensive medical expense plans - basic medical expense There are certain plans which cover only sickness and not accidents.
There are some plans which cover vice-versa.
There are also plans which are very specific about what constitutes an accident.
For this reason, it is important that you understand what accident means and what it is understood as by the medical insurance industry.
Disability income plans These are also known as loss of time, loss of income or replacement income plans.
These plans pay benefits to the insured if he is unable to work due to a disability.
Payments can be received by the insured on a monthly or weekly basis depending on the plan the insured has taken.
Accident plan benefits are usually paid for accident death, accidental loss of limb, loss of income, accidental dismemberment, surgical and hospital expenses and any expenses related to visits to the health care professionals.
In case of a death, the death benefit will be paid to the nominated beneficiary according to the plan.
The beneficiary will be chosen by the policy holder.
There may either be a primary beneficiary or two or three beneficiaries.
Another thing that must be taken into account at the time of considering accidental death is that it does not have to be instant.
This means that it is possible for a death benefit to be paid out even if the policy holder has died weeks or months after an accident.
This is only under circumstances when the death has somehow resulted from the accident.
However, in such cases, there are time limits set in place.