When is pregnancy a pre-exsisting condition?

Question

I am just curious how that works, is it ever classified a pre-exsistiong condition or is it if you go to the dr. and you're not pregnant then go back and the insurance company denies you? Or is this for new paitents to the insurance company? I am really curious how this works.

Answer 1

According to HIPAA (The health insurance portability and accountability act), health insurers cannot consider pregnancy a pre-existing condition. Federal law also bars pregnancy from being a pre-existing condition, however, the insurance companies apparently have found some loopholes with this issue as far as not covering pregnant women in some cases.

This website explains this very issue quite well here:
http://parenting.ivillage.com/pregnancy/phealthcare/0,,midwife_46wb,00.html

Answer 2

A preexisting condition is defined as an illness or injury for which the person has been under the care of a physician and has received medical care or advice or a condition for which a reasonable person should have sought treatment.

Over 41 million Americans are uninsured and many of those who are insured are underinsured. As a result, there are approximately 13% of women who become pregnant each year who are not insured, which often results in inadequate prenatal care.

Another challenge uninsured pregnant women face is the notion from many insurance plans that pregnancy is a pre-existing condition. Medicaid, a federal funded program for low income persons, will accept women who are already pregnant.

http://www.americanpregnancy.org/planningandpreparing/affordablehealthcare.html

Answer 3

It really depends on the insurance. There are some insurance coverages that will consider it a preexisting condition and some that don't. What you need to do is contact your insurance company and ask what their policy is for covering pregnant woman. It is also helpful to know how much of the birth they pay. Full coverage/co-pay stuff like that.
So call your insurance or call around to differant companies.
They should not consider it preexisting but some do.

Answer 4

Pregnancy is a pre-existing condition if you know you are pregnant or should have known you were pregnant at the time in sign-up for new health insurance.

And it's misleading to say that HIPA makes it illegal to consider pregnancy a pre-existing condition.

What HIPA (Health Insurance Portability Act) basically says, if you have group health insurance, and you change to a different group health insurance, then the new insurance must cover any pre-existing conditions there were covered by the old insurance.

Answer 5

As long as you haven't seen a doctor for your pregnancy yet, you should be able to be suprised and find out you are pregnant and be covered. Mind you, this won't work when you are more than a few weeks past your missed period.

A lot of insurance companies require you pay extra for maternity coverage and you have to wait so long after being covered before you can become pregnant. If you claim your LMP was a different day to be covered, you can be charged with insurance fraud.

Answer 6

pre-existing means you have it before....now insurance counts it as this if it will not go away.....such as arthritis...I found out I was preg. and still was able to get insurance through AFLAC because they consider it as a reason to up the price a little but no a decline of service.

Answer 7

if you apply for health insurance while pregnant and do not disclose it you can have your coverage dropped due to a pre-exsisting condition.

Answer 8

It's when you try to sign up for new insurance when you are pregnant.