Having health insurance gives you the peace of mind that you can get the treatment you need, when you need it.
The benefits of health insurance
With health insurance, you’ll have
Faster access to treatment by avoiding public hospital waiting lists
Less financial stress by reducing your costs of private treatment and time off work
More choice over when and where you receive treatment for qualifying medical conditions
With certain Health Insurance providers, you will have access to non-PHARMAC treatments which are not available within the public health system.
Public system vs. private insurance
New Zealand has a public healthcare system that will look after your acute (serious) needs and a public no-fault accident insurance scheme (ACC) that covers you for accidental injury. However if you need to see a specialist, have non-acute surgery or a diagnostic procedure (such as an MRI), the public system will put you on a waiting list. This is where health insurance can help.
Non urgent care
If a condition is a non-emergency condition, in the public health system you will usually need to go through an assessment process and qualify for ‘elective’ treatment. Common elective treatments include: hip or knee replacement, heart surgery, hysterectomy, cataract removal, cancerous tumour removal, and diagnostic services such as endoscopy, laparoscopy, MRI scans, tonsillectomy, and grommets. Experience tells us that this wait for elective treatment can extend into multiple years for non-urgent operations and treatments, which leaves the patient in discomfort or pain and may be causing the condition to worsen.
Private health insurance helps with the cost of many non-urgent procedures and provides faster access to private hospitals for the treatment. Not having to wait for treatment means getting back to work faster and enjoying a better quality of life.
Do you want faster access to health treatments by avoiding public hospital waiting lists? If so, call us to discuss your health insurance options.
