Health Insurance for Adult Child Graduate Student

[ZMAN]

Our daughter is on our family health plan which covers adult children through age 26, even if they are not students. The plan is through Independent Health here in Western New York, a good local provider. I purchase the plan through my local bar association. The plan has no yearly or overall cap.

Daughter will be 26 in a month and is a new graduate student in NYC. She is included in the NYSHIP plan for CUNY grad students, but that plan has a yearly cap of $350,000 for in network expenses, but does not seem to have an overall cap. I would like to buy her some type of umbrella health coverage in case there was a catastrophic event, but that does not seem to be available. I could also COBRA her for a few years on my plan, but that would include redundant coverage at the low end for doctor visits and the like which she has on the NYSHIP plan, and will be very expensive.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this. Is $350,000 in yearly coverage enough? Has anyone ever heard of a pure umbrella that would only kick in above $350,000, or some other amount above that? Am I just being a worrywart?

Thanks for the help.

[Martha]

I take it that she is a New York resident. New York has put out a guide to individual health insurers: New York Consumer Guide to Health Insurers - Introduction

NY is a guaranteed issue state and community rated. This means that a young person will pay as much for a policy and an older person with a serious illness. http://healthinsuranceinfo.net/getinsured/new-york/ My guess is that the likelihood of an inexpensive option is low.

As far as umbrella medical insurance, I had never heard of it. Intriguing idea.

EDIT: NY, like other guaranteed issue states have a problem with adverse selection keeping costs high in the individual insurance market. Looking at the www.healthinsuranceinfo.net guide for New York, I wonder if it is possible for her to use that to her advantage. Maybe she could risk waiting to see if she is bumping up on the 350,000 yearly limit (bad accident? Need lots of surgeries?) and then apply for a guaranteed issue plan. You would want to be sure that the effective date of the plan is the application date. There is no waiting period or preexisting condition exclusion if she hasn't had a break in coverage.

Just a thought that possibly could be explored.