Taking trips to other countries can be an amazing experience. Traveling to a foreign country allows you to experience unheard-of sights, immerse yourself in different cultures, eat new foods, and take part in never-before-had adventures. However, when someone plans a trip, they most likely spend hours planning out the hotels, booking, and researching attractions. However, planning is the most important part of the trip. People change portions of the trip based on how expensive it is.
Traveling to a different country can make a person lose an entire trip or make someone lose an entire year’s worth of income. Traveling to another country is and should be expensive. However, when someone gets sick or injures themselves out of the country, they would not think of how losing a trip or a year’s worth of income is the farthest medical attention can be.
Accident, illness, and food poisoning are all things people don’t think about. They happen to people every single day. If someone out of the country gets sick, the financial impact is something that can change a life. There are places that have to deal with these kinds of things on a day-to-day basis.
They are locations that help people sick and wounded. They help people that have to deal with a life-changing situation. There are places that help prevent other issues from arising. Travel medical insurance and hospitals work in a way that protects everyone involved and saves lives and money along the way.</p>
Why Hospital Bills Abroad Are Higher Than You Would Expect
Many believe health care outside the United States i
s cheap. Sometimes that is the case. However, the truth is much more complicated. The costs vary dramatically depending on the country, region, and if you go to a public or private hospital. Due to a variety of factors like efficiency and cleanliness, travelers almost always go to private hospitals, but those hospitals have private hospital prices.
Many people do not know that outside the United States, hospitals often require full upfront payment before delivering treatment. For example, hospitals located in Thailand, Mexico, Indonesia, and some parts of Europe are not going to release you unless you pay your bill in full. At some of these hospitals, to initiate treatment, they have to first ensure you are able to pay. This ends up creating a concerning situation without travel insurance, especially in the case of a serious injury or if you are unable to communicate due to a language barrier.
The price difference catches some travelers off guard. It is not discrimination; it is just the way business is. A hospital understands tourists have medical insurance, so they implement international patient pricing. For instance, what a local might pay $50 for, you could pay $400. For a hospital admission that a resident is billed $200 for, you could be billed $3,000. The costs just keep adding up with expensive diagnostic tests, medications, doctor consultations, and a growing bill.
With a hospital stay, there’s also the issue of all the other costs that are involved. The main one being an expensive ambulance ride. In a tourist country, that can be hundreds, even thousands, of dollars. A hospital stay can also be very costly. A lot of the time they have diagnostic tests like CT and MRI scans, and there is also “tourist pricing” for those. Even some of the basic things like antibiotics and IV fluids that are administered in a hospital can be very costly and can be about ten times what you would expect. If you happen to need to get surgery, that is also an expense that is likely going to be over $10,000.
<p>One issue that many travelers forget is the cost of having to leave the country in case of a medical emergency. In the case of a medical emergency abroad, having to use the air ambulance is sometimes the most expensive part of the entire event. If you are in a part of the world that does not have any hospitals that can help you—this is far more common than many people might think—you have to be flown to a new city or even a different country for the proper medical attention.
Air ambulance services from Southeast Asia to the United States can be around $80,000 to $200,000. Cos
ts are still high for air ambulance services that are located in the central part of the world, like Europe or Central America, with services costing thousands of dollars. If you don’t have some kind of insurance, that bill is all yours.
How Travel Medical Insurance Protec
ts You Financially
Travel medical insurance is designed for a specific purpose: to protect travelers from going bankrupt due to worrying medical costs. Travel insurance is not the same as medical insurance. Travel insurance is designed to protect you from other medical costs, such as losing medical supplies or trip delays. Travel medical insurance is emergency, urgent health care coverage abroad. It covers emergency medical care, hospital stays, surgery, medical tests, emergency medical supplies, or medical evacuation.
One surprising benefit is how easy it is to get started. Many insurance providers offer 24/7 global support. When assistance is needed, the insurance company will get in contact with the hospital and give them all the insurance details, so you won’t have to pay thousands upfront. This can save lots of time and frustration in order to avoid financial disputes and focus on getting the medical help you need to get healthy elsewhere.</p>
It can even save you money in expensive medical emergencies. Getting an insurance policy means you won’t have to pay the entire $8,000 for a broke
n leg in Italy, and the hospital stay in Japan won’t cost over $12,000, and medical evacuations from Costa Rica to Miami won’t have to cost thousands of dollars. This is what makes the insurance policy so valuable. You won’t have to go into debt for a crisis.
Why You Should Care About Coverage
Most travelers think that when they have a U.S. health insurance plan, that coverage will continue outside the country. Unfortunately, that almost never happens, especially with Medicare since it does not provide coverage for healthcare outside the United States. Some employer health plans may provide some emergency healthcare coverage, but usually, you have to pay that expense yourself before you can submit a claim to the insurance company for reimbursement that can take a long time to get paid.
Most people do not realize that travel insurance purchased on a credit card does not provide much, if any, coverage for serious medical situations or for getting evacuated if you need medical care that is not available where you are located. This all means that when you travel outside the U.S., you are financially at risk.
Your travel medical insurance steps in to fill those gaps with dependable protection. Travel medical insurance gives you access to better hospitals and faster care with English-speaking aides who assist with foreign healthcare systems. Most importantly, it gives you peace of mind. Knowing you are covered allows you to travel and relax without thinking of “what ifs.”
Read More: PPO vs HMO Abroad: Understanding International Health Networks for Expats
Why do Travelers Trust ExpatGlobalMedical?
At ExpatGlobalMedical, we take pride in specializing in travel protection, travel medical insurance, and medical coverage specially designed to meet the protection needs of travelers, expats, nomads, and global families.
We are based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and alongside market leaders, we have designed plans to give you access to global assistance and medical networks so that evacuation services are available to you whenever needed. For travelers and expats, we have life insurance products available as well from our trusted partners, Transamerica, John Hancock, Ole’, and American Fidelity, thereby offering peace of mind in every aspect.
Your needs differ from the needs of the next traveler, and we understand that. We do our best to get you the coverage suited for your travel plans so you never have to worry about the enormous bills that hospitals charge, the evacuation that might be needed without prior warning, or that the treatment you need might be denied.
Conclusion
Seeing new parts of the globe is a thrilling adventure, especially when getting a chance to experience different cultures, beautiful sights, and unique adventures. However, getting the chance to travel is not without its risks. Even getting sick, like with food poisoning or a severe infection, or even getting injured from an accident can lead to spending thousands of dollars. If you need to be evacuated from the country to a hospital or a medevac, that can cost upwards of hundreds of thousands! To risk spending money like that, getting travel medical insurance is worth taking out a policy with those particular risks.
Traveling anywhere without medical insurance is beyond stupid. If anything were to happen to you, you would be risking your health and your financial situation. ExpayGlobalMedical is a trusted partner when taking the risk to travel anywhere around the world.
