Do Health Insurance Companies Cover Migraine Headaches?
Everyone is starting to find it harder to buy health insurance coverage for themselves. If you are looking for family coverage (which includes coverage for wife and children), the premiums are so high that you’re usually looking at more than a week’s worth of pay for their cost. As list of medical conditions that are “not covered/just barely covered” continues to increase, the other side of the list - which is what most of us consider needed health coverage - goes down. When you combine that reality with how many people are unable to pay the overpriced premiums each month, you begin to realize why many could end up being in danger of having a lot of medical conditions that could require treatment.
Migraine headaches are the most recent fatality to come from limitations set by the insurance companies. In the past these incapacitating headaches created a learning experience for the medical profession as treatment ranged from tranquilizers, muscle relaxers, and a variety of pain killers.
Work was done on developing and advancing new prescription medications during the 1980’s and 1990’s, precisely for migraine treatment, control, and relief. Some of the medications created worked well by themselves, some were combined with pain medication, as well as other times types of medications. Now that we’re in the 21st century, there are a lot of medications that have been created explicitly for migraines, and people who suffer from this condition are able to find them in numerous locations throughout this country as well as other parts of the world. The problem comes from the fact that many of these medications are priced beyond the reach of average workers, and health insurance either covers an inadequate amount of the cost, or doesn’t cover them at all.
This kind of insurance situation puts people who deal with migraines on a regular basis with a limited amount of pills each month (i.e. 10-12), and then they have to decide which one of their migraines they’ll use one of the pills for, when this is medication they should be taking whenever they have a migraine. Insurance doesn’t cover them if all the pills are used before the end of the month, so the expense to reorder more pills becomes theirs alone. These migraine sufferers will continue to pay their premiums, but due to the skyrocketed prices of many of these medications, many are unable to pay for them out of their own pocket, so they just suffer through. It has been found that migraines can often be signs of other unknown health issues. Some of these quickly end up in a stroke. And what are the results of this occurs on a night when they felt they couldn’t, or just didn’t, take the medication?
Medicaid is one such possibility applied for by increasing numbers of people every month. But of course, as with all government sponsored programs, Medicaid is highly regulated, difficult to qualify for financially and mired in endless paperwork and bureaucracy. Income restrictions are strict and closely monitored. The government will also periodically review your case and all appointments must be met and phone calls returned promptly or your benefits could be canceled immediately without notice.
It’s really sad that we now have medications that have been developed, are needed, and plentiful, yet we have insurance companies are creating difficult to impossible situations for people to have access to vitally needed medications. So the question now is whether people suffering with migraines become the current victim of insurance cutbacks, or is there going to be an option for migraine sufferers to have the coverage needed to receive the medication required? Questions like these, and more, are now before the new Congress for consideration. Hopefully these answers and more with be forthcoming in the near future.