graeme0001

Hi everyone,

I am a UK citizen and my wife is a US citizen. We currently live in the UK and 2 weeks ago I received my immigration visa to move to the US. Last night we discovered that my wife is pregnant!

Can anyone answer the following?

1. We plan on still going to the US, can we get private medical insurance that will cover her, knowing that my wife is pregnant

2. If the answer to question 1 is a big no no. Does anyone know how much the pregnancy and birth might cost in Virginia or Maryland.

If anyone has any helpful comments I would be more that grateful.

Many thanks

Graeme

penguinsix

Pregnancy is not considered a pre-existing condition. You should be able to get medical coverage as part of whatever medical coverage you are going to have...but it is important to check with your HR department or whomever is going to provide insurance on this point.

There was a thread on this recently if you use the search. I think the consensus was it is far to difficult to predict the expense if you 'pay as you go'. It could be < $10,000, and it could be > $1,000,000 if there are significant complications. The long and the short was get insurance and then go from there.

kins

Congratulations!

Do you have a job to go to, and does it offer any medical benefits?

If not then you need to find private insurance. There is absolutely no way I would even consider giving birth in the US and paying cash. Even with insurance the copayments routinely run into thousands of dollars. Plus your baby may need medical care after the birth - a friend's baby needed $1m worth of care in the first year of her life.

You need to shop around a load of insurance companies. medibroker.com is one place you could try, I'm sure other people have suggestions, or just spend a lot of time on t'internet looking.

dunroving

Unless your US employer has a stellar health insurance package, I would seriously ask them to postpone your start of employment by 12 months and have your baby born in the UK. Otherwise you could end up spending a heck of a lot of cash.

And if they won't postpone your job start by 12 months, I would not take the job.

denzil75

I had my eldest son in the states and got to see how much the insurance company was billed. Take it from me you do not want to be paying for the birth, I had a straightforward no drugs etc birth and that still came close to $10k 5 years ago, not to mention all the pre-natal exams, blood test, scans etc etc.

Look into the insurance issue before you go and if the insurance company won't cover your wife then I'd go with Dunroving's advice and wait a year.

Good luck and congratulations

YankeemovingAbroad

Its very rare for a birth to be covered by a insurance company that you recently signed up with.Insurance companies look for ways to drop clients who cost them money so it would indeed not be the norm for them to back you for such an expensive payout and you haven't been with them at least a year.

My sister who has her own business just went through this,she changed insurance coverage to a different company then found out she was pregnant weeks laters.If I were you first course of action if you have a job waiting in the States is to inquire if they will cover the birth.If not I agree with the posters who suggested to wait after the birth to immigrate. Best of luck what ever you decide!!

fatbrit

Dunno how much you're planning on earning, but if it's not much, here's an idea:

http://www.dhr.state.md.us/how/medical/mchip.htm

There's probably a Virginia one, too. In fact you might well base where you live on who offers the best free coverage.

penguinsix

Federal law prohibits insurance companies from considering pregnancy a pre-existing condition. However, there are some loopholes they may try to use.

I'd suggest this link for more information

http://parenting.ivillage.com/pregna...e_46wb,00.html

scrubbedexpat099

I would put it the other way around, there are certain circumstances where federal law requires an Insurance Company to provide coverage.

There is a posibility that the OP might be able to get into one of those categories, I would think the chances are remote on what has been posted so far.

Even with Insurance its going to cost.

fatbrit

From Op's earlier posts, he is presumably going to be self employed!

scrubbedexpat099

Sounds like it is up to the missus to get the job, with health insurance.

penguinsix

That will suck. I guess this case, stay in the UK. Or get over, incorporate as an LLC as fast as possible, hire your wife and yourself and employees, and get some insurance through the LLC.

But even that would cost more than it should.

scrubbedexpat099

As I see it that woud only work if the NHS would be considered to be prior qualifying coverage.

penguinsix

I think people said NHS is considered as prior coverage but it's nearly impossible to get documentation out of NHS that says something like that. But someone who has gone through it can probably attest to how it works a bit easier than me.

scrubbedexpat099

Somebody said in one State with one Insurer in their case they had got it treated as prior coverage.