Insuring your home or car is a no-brainer, but some people aren’t sure why Private Medical Insurance can be a good idea.

Why get health insurance?

Private Medical Insurance is designed to ensure that if you need medical treatment in future, you won’t need to worry about NHS waiting lists or paying for the cost of the treatment. If you’re treated privately, private medical insurance will pay all or some of your bills.

Having private medical insurance will get you diagnosed and treated quickly, as well as offer you a prompt referral to a consultant and admission to a private hospital at a time and place that is convenient for you. With Private Medical Insurance you’ll have a choice of private hospital from an agreed list provided by your insurer - most hospitals offer a private en-suite room, TV and a choice of food, which you wouldn’t necessarily get as a normal patient.

In short, the main benefits of Private Medical Insurance are:

Shorter waiting times for treatment than on the NHS

Better facilities

Faster diagnosis

Choose from a range of private facilities

Choose a convenient time for appointments and treatments

It’s affordable. Long gone are the days where it was only affordable for the rich and famous.

A more cost-effective option than Private Medical Insurance are Health cash plans.

A health cash plan allows you to spread the cost of some of you and your family’s health care not covered free by the NHS for a regular, monthly premium. Private Medical Insurance is not the same thing as a health care cash plan, and you can even have both at the same time. Health insurance usually covers you for treatment of conditions that develop after you take out the plan, whereas you can use a cash plan to pay for ongoing and routine treatments.