The MedLion program is a system for access to primary care, and not health insurance. But if possible, you should have health insurance to pay for expensive, unforeseen catastrophes, just like we use car insurance. After all, we don’t use car insurance to cover our windshield cleaner and our oil changes, right? We use it for the big, costly (but rarely occurring accident). The trick is to be smart and use health insurance the way it was meant to be.
First, shop around and find a quality primary care physician that offers economical fees with visits, labs, imaging, and referrals (like MedLion!). Most of your health visits during the year will be to primary care to treat minor ailments, monitor moderate ailments, and prevent major ailments. Using the car insurance analogy, this is the part where you find a nice mechanic for routine oil changes, tires, windshield repairs, and other car maintenance and small repairs that insurance isn’t used for.
Second, find a health insurance plan where you don’t have to excessively pay for excessive primary care (you’ve already taken care of that, remember?), but rather, a high-deductible/low premium plan where it’s sole purpose is to cover major medical expenses to avoid personal financial disaster. Ironically, these types of plans cost much less per month. Using the car insurance analogy, this is the part where you find good auto insurance for all the expensive headaches that come with a major accident.
Why isn’t health insurance as easy and inexpensive as car insurance? Simple. As a society we have spoiled insurance companies. We expect them to take care of every little thing, even maintenance of our own health! We expect them to take care of the cheapest generic medicines, and pay for the least expensive x-rays. They happily do it, but at a cost to you. If we expected auto insurance to take care of all our minor automotive needs, such as oil changes, new tires, and car fluids, car insurance would also increase in cost as well!
The solution is to use health insurance the smart way, only for unexpected, expensive, occasional catastrophes, the reason it was created.
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