I have yet to hear of any insurance company that pays for surgery to correct nearsightedness. Having been shackled with glasses most of my life, this disappoints me.
If you break your leg, insurance will pay for a cast to fix it, instead of providing you with a lifetime supply of crutches. Yet, while there are plenty of companies that will pay for glasses every couple of years, they seem reluctant to pay for the surgery. It seems to me it would be in their favor - one surgery would cost less than a lifetime of glasses, I’d think. So why don’t they? Should they? What’s the flaw in my logic?
It would seem that not too many folks care about your question.
For my part, I’m disappointed that my insurance won’t pay for eye surgey, but I hold no grudge.
With the exception of some “add ons”, all of my insurance is paid by my employer. Since somebody else has done all of the work to assemble and maintain a group policy that covers me in a reasonable fashion for most any malady, it’s hard to be critical that they don’t do EXACTLY what I want.
If I want insurance that covers eye surgery, I can always go out and buy my own.
Of course, I’ve worn glasses since I was 10 years old so it’s second nature to me. The only two things about wearing glasses that I don’t like are not being able to see the clock when I wake up in the middle of the night, and having to constantly clean them. I despise looking around dirt and smudges.
But if you find a reasonable way to get insurance to pony up the cost of eye surgery, please let me know. Even at today’s prices, I’m considering paying for it myself.
Let’s say that an eye exam and new pair of glasses cost $200 - a fair estimate (probably high for most folks).
Lasik surgery currently costs $3,000, right? If so, that would buy 15 pair of glasses (3000/200=15). Assuming you need new glasses every 18 months (which is mighty often), those 15 pair would last you 22.5 years!
I wear contacts and I would LOVE to have my insurance take away that burden. I’d go under the knife… well, the beam of light, actually… in a second.
But my plan DOES cover some eye things such as exams and contacts, so I am not left in the cold.
My beef was that my insurance company did not cover the Zyban perscription I got under it’s perscription plan. While I was able to deduct the $100 a pop (with one refill) medication from my deductable, I could not use my perscription card.
Why? Because it is not designed to help me with an illness. Right. Tobacco addiction isn’t an illness, but alcohol addiction is.
When I complained to my insurance company how wouldn’t it be a better idea to cover Zyban now than pay for treatment for lung cancer or another smoking-related illness in 20 years, they didn’t have a very good comeback. :rolleyes:
Yer pal,
Satan
I HAVE BEEN SMOKE-FREE FOR:
Three months, two weeks, five days, 13 hours, 14 minutes and 23 seconds.
4422 cigarettes not smoked, saving $552.76.
Life saved: 2 weeks, 1 day, 8 hours, 30 minutes.
The company I work for gives you a one-shot $1000 toward laser eye surgery ( you paythe balance). But then you give up all you vision benefits for as long as you work there. I have certainloy beenconsidering it.
I guess the difference is that a broken leg is an immediate emergency and you can live no problem with nearsightedness. (and you won’t near crutches forever) The surgery is for less severely near- or far-sighted people and reverses itself over time so presumably they would be back to paying for glasses/lenses at some point.
SouthernStyle - yeah, I knew that while this was a topic near and dear to my heart, there wouldn’t be a whole lot of sympathy.
I guess my main point is that the only reason glasses are seen as an acceptable solution is because they’ve been around for so long that no one sees them as strange. It would be nice to have insurace companies that are enlightened enough to see that surgery is a better alternative and to support it, so that price goes down and quality goes up. It’s interesting to hear that there are apparently some out there that are, to a degree.
People claim that nearsightedness is merely an inconvenience, not a major problem. Well, I disagree. It has affected my life probably more than even I realize. Obviously, it’s not as big a deal as other problems out there, but still, I hate it. Anyway, I kind of lost my point there. I just wanted to rant a little bit.
Well, as one who has had the lasiks, and paad some $4K for it, I would say to all: Go get it, now*. Hold up liquor stores if you have to. :D. But, Smeg, the question is; do the policy holders want to pay for your lasiks? insurance companies pay for nothing, YOU pay for it thru your premiums. Se, insurance is just a way for everyone to pay a little more so that you don’t get wiped out by a catastrophic illness.
Really, and this means you Southern, and tretak, etc. get it. You’ll thank me later. In the long run, it pays for itself, so in a way, it is free.
I would like to think that as the surgery becomes more common, more companies will start covering it. I think that it’s a far better proposition than paying for eyeglasses. Of course, since neither my SO’s or my ex’s benefit plans cover optical anymore, I suppose it may be wishful thinking on my part.
I an nearly blind in one eye. I have terrible astigmitism (sp?). I can only wear my contacts for about 5 hours before I have to take them out. I can’t stand glasses and prefer to going visonless to having to wear them. I think that Lasik should be covered.
Btw Smeghead - one of the local places is doing Lasik for $900. My sister is considering it. Her employer gives her employees $1000 medical a year, to be used at their own discretion, and unused balances get carried over from year to year.
The OP asks Should insurance pay for corrective eye surgery? I think it should. There is a part of my body that doesn’t work properly (my eyes, no funny jokes). It is fixable, it should be covered.
They call it cosmetic, but what’s so cosmetic about not being able to see.
No, I don’t think it should be covered because it can still be effectively “treated” for a far cheaper cost (glasses) and it’s non-life-threatening. My insurance premiums are high enough, thankyouverymuch. But if you have a “flexible spending account” you can set aside money for next year and pay for it tax-deferred. And if you have it done in January, you can borrow against your deductions and get a free non-interest bearing “loan” from the account. BTW, I’m not biased because my husband is legally blind without his glasses and will be having the surgery in the next 3 years, if all goes according to our budget plan.
Here in Cincinnati, the cost for both eyes has gone down to $1000 due to a competitor moving to town.
For the most part, coverage limitations are usually set by the purchaser of an insurance policy. If ABC, Inc. wants to offer its employees low-cost insurance, it has two choices. It can cut covered benefits (in the case of mental health [including smoking-cessation], vision, and reproductive health, which are the easiest to cut), or it can require a deductible, or both. The more services that are covered, the higher the premium and/or deductible.
The main reason Wellbutrin is covered, while Zyban isn’t is simply the labelling and side benefits for each drug. Zyban comes with all kinds of support information and resources, and these cost money that gets passed onto the consumer. Wellbutrin doesn’t. If you’re anxious to use Zyban, have your doctor write the script for Wellbutrin, and ask for the information and support package that comes with Zyban. Most doctors are happy to do this.
Plastic surgery is usually not covered (there are generally exceptions for disfigurement from accidents and previous surgeries such as mastectomy) because it’s just that… it’s for cosmetic purposes and doesn’t enhance one’s health or save one’s life. If someone cries her eyes out at night because her boobs are smaller than her sister’s, well, that’s what counselors and savings accounts are for.
Finally, I think that corrective eye surgery such as LASIK should come under the same conditions as plastic surgery. In other words, it should not be covered unless the alternative is legal blindness or prohibitively expensive or Coke-bottle-thick lenses.
BTW, if you have a flexible spending account, research any limitations BEFORE you have a procedure done. Someone I used to work with had some rather expensive tattoo removal surgery, and the administrator of the FSA plan disallowed it. She’s gonna be paying the dermatologist for quite some time.
My finding is that most doctors are clueless about what exactly insurance companies will cover. My doctor, when prescrbing Zyban, did not even know the COST of the drug.
Now, while he might have been so kind as to make it for Wellbutrin instead, the fact is that the pharacist told me that a lot of insurance companies were no longer covering prescriptions of Wellbutrin either because of - you guessed it - abuse by doctors and patients who were prescribing the drug designed to treat depression to people who wanted to quit smoking.
Definitely another case of damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
Yer pal,
Satan
TIME ELAPSED SINCE I QUIT SMOKING:
Three months, three weeks, one day, 36 minutes and 27 seconds.
4521 cigarettes not smoked, saving $565.13.
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first of all, congratulations on your continuing victory against nicotine!
we had the same problem. i quit (21 months ago today) using the nicotrol patch for three weeks. no insurance coverage there, it was purchased over the counter.
sunflower (mrs. longhair) quit the same day, but was not helped by the patch. we caalled for a zyban perscription, not knowing of the wellbuterin option. sunflower used the patch for a month, and i gladly paid the $100.00.
i am not sure how your calculator works, but we put the money we would have spent on cigarettes away, even increasing it as the prices rose, and used the money to spend our 25th wedding anniversary in san juan puerto rico!
on one hand, the insurance companies are short sighted, but even at the cost, i am sure glad zyban is available.
I’ve wondered and grumbled about this before. I have been wearing contacts since I was ten, and I will continue to wear them for years to come (unless I come into some money for surgery!) I have at least fifty-five more years of life on me and my insurance covers a pair of contacts a year. Assumeing $200 a pair that gives me $11,000 worth of contacts. A simple surgery would save them money and me annoyance.
And no, it is not plastic surgery for me. I have such bad eyesight that glasses give me “tunnel vision”. My contacts have been deemed “medically neccesary”.
Ugh! If only I could afford it!
This is my beef exactly. Insurance should only cover life-threatening illnesses? To continue the analogy I started earlier, barring infection, a broken leg is not life threatening. So why not just pay for a pair of crutches and a course of antibiotics?
Insurance companies, and people in general, seem to think that nearsightedness is a minor problem, and glasses are a good enough solution. I disagree. Its impact on your life is severe enough that it is worth using a surgical solution. As I said before, the only reason glasses are seen as a good solution is because that is the only solution that was around for a long time. It’s like saying “why use anesthetic? It’s expensive, and we can operate just as well without it.” We have found a better solution, and I think it would be nice to see it recognized as such.
I wear glasses and I disagree that the impact on my life is severe. Would it be “nice” to be able to see without them? Absolutely. Can I see just fine with them? Yup.
BTW, my health plan covers neither glasses nor contacts so I certainly don’t expect them to pony up for surgery. Besides the overwhelming charges up front (everyone would run and get it done the second it was paid for by insurance), it would also encourage secondary claims by infections and problems linked to the surgery. And since we pay for our premium out of our pocket (hubby is self employed), I want the premium to be as low as possible.
The notion that an insurance company should pay for anything other than catastrophic illnesses and hospitalizations is relatively new. I remember going to the doctor as a kid, and payment was expected, by the patients, up front. The insurance company didn’t get involved unless there was a major illness or hospitalization. I think this sort of coverage is all an employer really owes his employees. Anything additional is gravy and should be appreciated as a perk.
