Lose medical card with private health insurance?

runswithascript

Hi

My mother cannot afford private health insurance herself at the moment and I would like to get it for her before prices increase by around 50% on May 1st. The thing is she already has a medical card and it seems to offer a lot that private health insurance does not, like free GP visits and virtually free prescriptions. Do you lose the medical card automatically if you have private health insurance?

Cushie Butterfield

No, definitely not.

The only difference she will see (apart from possibly a shorter wait to see a consultant on a privaye basis) is that if she avails of private medical care in a public hospital that her medical card is used to cover the statutory govt charges element of her accomodation charges & her private medical insurance policy will cover the rest (subject to her particular coverage), which basically means that the insurance co will potentially save paying out €750 per year on her policy. if she avails of private medical care in a private hospital the medical card will be of no consequence.

FloatingVoter

Nope, due to fluctuations in my circumstances down the years I've stuck with VHI but am entitled to and use the medical card. It is virtually impossible to tell the difference between public / private treatment anymore...unless and until we get onto waiting lists for elective ops. Then going private pulls rank.

Your mum keeps the card.

All the hype you're hearing is to encourage young fit and immortal people to get insured. When they're done running marathons and lecturing smokers they will be clogging up the health system with their heart attacks, strokes and dementia.

Getting mum onto private now seems a wise and generous thing to do. Go for it is my advice.

runswithascript

Thanks for the information, and sorry for the late reply.

So I went with one of the better plans, Company Care Plus from LAYA, for my mother and a starter plan for myself. The starter plan is ~€400 and it does not offer much, but it gets the clock running on the five years I have to wait before I can use private health care to treat pre-existing conditions, I have been assured once I bump up the cover after three years, that is the cover I will receive for pre-existing and any new illnesses when the five years has elapsed.

On retaining the medical card I attend one hospital for treatment of an illness where I was told they would be asking any patient with private cover to stop attending. I will not be telling them about by private cover, it is nobody's business but my own.