Health insurance, Medi Share, CHM question.

[BRI]

Last year's catastrophic plan was $1408/month. This year's lowest plan is $2862/month. Curious if anyone on here is enrolled through Medi Share or CHM? Would be curious to talk to someone with first hand experience or knowledge. Feel free to PM.

 

[npaden]

Our family was on Medishare from 2018 to the end of this month and are going to be switching to BCBS effective 12/1. It was a good deal for us. We only hit our deductible (which was $10,500) one time but it saved us a bunch of money using the PPO discounts.

The reason we are switching is because my wife has Parkinsons and a new drug got approved last month that is $5k per month. She was in the drug trial and it worked well for her so we are going to switch her to that drug. Medishare will only share 6 months of a prescription then they say it is something you should budget for on your own if you are going to continue on it and it isn't eligible for sharing anymore. So we would essentially get 4 months of the drug paid this first year and then never again. So we would be out of pocket $40k this first year then the full $60k after that.

With BCBS they just have you pay the $60 co-pay so switching will cost us $400 more per month for insurance so roughly $5k but will save us almost $60k in prescription costs. Pretty much a no brainer on switching.

Since we are switching off Medishare I downloaded all our claims history and stuck it in a spreadsheet. 2019 was knee surgery for my wife and 2021 was when we did the nuclear radiation brain scan to confirm she had Parkinsons. I think it worked out good for everyone. Premiums were starting to climb as we got older though.

 

[BRI]

Thanks for the info. Wife and I are fairly healthy and rarely go in for services. I haven't gone to a doctor in nearly 3 years and on no medications. She's a retired RN and knows when it's necessary and when not. If it was just me, I'd roll the dice and be uninsured but the wife and financial planner disagrees. Really just looking to cover the "oh crap" scenario.

 

[Big Sky Guy]

That's a mortgage. Our healthcare system is bonkers.

I was on Samaritan Ministries for a couple years, started out around $500/month for the two of us, then by time we got off was $600/month and I believe now is over that. While there are improvements to be made I still think it was a great way to handle things. 10 or 11/12 months I was sending a check or paypal directly to a recipient, NOT Samaritan ministries so they do a good job of directing the funds where they need to IMO. Thankfully the proration months were all during my PT, but even then it was like 90% (they would only cover 90% of my bills that month due to sharing exceeding giving) so that is what the additional $174 you see is. They were WAY less difficult to work with than I thought and their portal made tracking sharing and submitting bills super easy.

I ended up paying $574 out of pocket for this $40k (was probably more like $50-55k but generally 20% came off for paying out of pocket) surgery a few years ago.

The downside is you do have to front some money, if you have a healthy savings/emergency fund it's a non-issue. Add on, I paid that $40k all with my CC out of pocket and paid off each month, so add the 2% travel credits I got back and I more than made up for the initial unshareable amount. They also have what some would consider "odd" requirements with church and pastor involvement. I think there are non-Christian sharing things out there now from what I've heard.

I believe now the initial unshareable amount is like $1k.

We have a HDHCP now, so the monthly premium is much cheaper, but I do know if and when we need it the deductible is going to sting a little more but overall I think still net savings but if you don't have access to an affordable plan sharing minsitries are about the best thing I know of.

Feel free to reach out if you have any questions. I was on CHM years ago but never had to use it, would guess similar though.



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