Health Insurance for the elderly
#1
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Joined: Sep 2022
Posts: 1
Health Insurance for the elderly
I am looking for sources/advice on health insurance for the elderly (87 years old), living or moving to Canada.
Thank you
Thank you
#3
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Joined: Feb 2013
Location: BC, Canada
Posts: 3,873
Re: Health Insurance for the elderly
Here in BC, we basically HAVE to have Extended Health Insurance plus Dental Insurance.
The BC Medical Services Plan (MSP) does cover visits to a family doctor (if you can find one), referrals to a specialist by the GP, all costs in hospital EXCEPT for the cost of the bed ....... choice of 4 bed room (cheapest), 2 bed or private. It does NOT cover the cost of prescriptions outside the hospital unless your income is below a certain level, which means you have to pay all costs.
MSP does not cover any dental costs, and only covers the basic cost of an annual eye test for seniors ......... and it seems that many opticians/optometrists charge more than the basic cost and so you have to pay extra. That is allowed in the coverage by MSP.
In BC, the company most used seems to be Pacific Blue Cross, while we are insured with Sun Life. Most policies have a deductible which starts new every January............. ours is $1000 for the cost of prescriptions, 4 physiotherapy sessions a year, and the cost of a bed in hospital. You have to pay for ambulances, but I don't whether our policy (or any other) will pay that cost. Some charges kick in automatically when you reach the deductible level, for others (eg hospital room) you pay first and claim later.
Dental Insurance may or may not cover all the costs of dental treatment. Ours covers only certain %ages of treatment. and we have to pay the remainder.
As a guideline, we currently pay $268 a month for Extended health and Dental Insurance.
That's just the example from 1 province, every province is different, so you need to do more checking.
Be aware that there are certain cases when immigration is not allowed, if the person has some illness that will become a burden to the Canadian system.
Last edited by scilly; Sep 8th 2022 at 11:42 pm.