Long Term Medical Health Insurance – Meaning, Coverage and Benefits of Long Term Medical Insurance

What is a Long Term Health Insurance?

Let’s begin by understanding the meaning of long term major medical health insurance. It is essentially a health insurance policy that is issued for a period of at least 2-3 years, unlike the short-term health insurance plans that last for only a year. Besides, short-term health insurance also demands yearly renewals to continue enjoying coverage.

Long-term health insurance does away with the hassle of yearly renewal since it can be issued for longer durations at once – starting from 2 or 3 years up to as long as you may wish for. This is why it is also known as long term major medical health insurance, as it provides more coverage in comparison to its counterpart – short-term health insurance plans.

What Does a Long Term Health Insurance Cover?

As compared to short-term health insurance, long-term healthcare insurance is relatively more comprehensive and includes wider areas of health services for coverage. Some of the healthcare expenses covered under long-term health insurance include:

• Coverage for critical illnesses, particularly those that are life-threatening. Examples include cancer, brain stroke, heart stroke, etc.
• Coverage for minor surgeries that may not need hospitalization for a long time. Examples are surgery for cataract, tonsilitis, or breast biopsy.
• Coverage for treatment cost, both before the surgery and after
• Coverage  for treatment of health conditions at the hospital, such as prolonged illness, disease, surgery, injury from accident, etc.
• Coverage for treatments that fall outside the conventional English medicine – Homeopathy, Ayurveda, Unani, and Yoga treatments
• Coverage for programs aimed at improving the overall health and well-being of the policy-holder
• Coverage for additional health services provided over and above those covered under the basic health insurance plan. Examples include maternity costs, waiver of room rent, etc. Covering these expenses can be of great help to the insured during major treatment costs at the hospital.

6 Benefits of Long Term Major Medical Health Insurance

Getting a long term health insurance plan for you and your loved ones has several advantages over the basic short-term plan. Let’s look at some of these here:

1. Highly convenient – A long-term health insurance policy offers much larger convenience to its policy-holder than the regular short-term plan. The latter is issued for 12 months and needs to be renewed every year to continue getting coverage for health treatments. Long-term healthcare insurance, on the other hand, is issued for longer durations (at least 2-3 years). This means you don’t need to remember renewing the policy annually. Plus, longer duration means coverage for a longer time as well.
2. No impact of change in market rates – The cost of medical insurance in India may keep changing regularly as a result of IRDAI regulations. Under such circumstances, buying a health insurance plan for the long term proves beneficial because it locks the premium amount payable to a specific sum, paid all at once for the next 2-3 years. This means that even if the price of the insurance policy increases after you’ve bought the long-term plan, the premium for you would still remain unaffected.
3. Eligibility for discounts – This is another advantage of choosing long-term health insurance since buying a policy for a longer duration entitles you to receive good discounts from the insurance provider. Also, the premium payable for a longer term is relatively lesser than the one under short-term plans.
4. Higher No-Claim Bonus – The policyholder is generally entitled to a no-claim bonus or NCB at the time of policy renewal in case he/she did not make any claims during the tenure of the plan. In case of long-term insurance, the NCB amount offered to the policy-holder is generally more than that of a short-term insurance policy. In addition, long-term insurance also allows for some extra claims while keeping the NCB intact.
5. Coverage for pre-existing diseases – If you have a pre-existing health condition that was prevalent before you bought health insurance, a long-term plan would be able to provide you coverage for it. This facility is not available in case of short-term health insurance.
6. Tax benefits – Buying health insurance for a longer term would also help you save a considerable amount of tax in your annual tax payments.

Which Health Insurance is Best in India?

After reviewing the several benefits offered under long-term health insurance plans, it’s only natural to ask – “Which is the best health insurance policy – short-term or long-term?” 

While buying health insurance for short terms does give you the advantage of paying a low premium, it cannot be denied that long-term healthcare insurance plans provide comprehensive coverage benefits, which cannot be obtained when buying short-term health insurance.

For instance, long-term plans cover pre-existing health conditions, not covered under insurance for short terms. Similarly, the scope of coverage under insurance plans for long term is also wider than the one offered by short-term policies.

Therefore, if you’re looking for the best health insurance plan in India, long-term policies can be your answer. And yes, to purchase the best long term health insurance for your needs, it’d be better to check and compare the policy features as well as benefits offered by various insurance providers before making your decision.