According to studies, having traumatic brain injuries (TBI) can put your health insurance at risk of being lost or modified depending on the gravity of the TBI.
Since most patients get their health coverage through their employment, suffering from TBI can affect their performance on their labors, therefore, it might affect drastically the health insurance as well when they need it the most. American researchers have determined over a three years’ coverage of data that the more severe the brain juries are, the more likely is he or she to lose or see changes in the health coverage.
Study author Eric Schneider from Brigham and Women’s Hospital said that primary policyholders lost their coverage since they were not able to work which lead to becoming unemployed.
Number of TBI patients are alarming
Approximately a number of 280.000 patients are taken to hospitals to be treated for TBI every year in the United States alone and a total of 2.5 million emergency room visits. Around 40% of these patients become unable to work leading them to become unemployed and take part in an everyday routine.
Using data from national health insurance database MarketScan, investigators were allowed to compare over 13,500 people under 65 years old with TBI to individuals who did not have TBI from January 2010 to December 2012.
The results showed that 30.7 percent of the patients with TBI had changes on their health insurances and a 27.6 percent that did not suffer from TBI also had their health insurances changed but this proved that patients with TBI are more likely to have their insurances altered.
It was unclear as to why the participants exactly changed insurance status — it could be due to factors like disability-based eligibility for various insurance programs, said Schneider.
These changes on the insurances are crucial for these patients, considering they require a constant health care, especially since they are often treated long after their brain injury took place.
“Some of these patients receive prolonged rehabilitation,” said neurosurgeon Dr. Kimon Bekelis, who deemed the findings a wake-up call for payers, doctors, and policymakers about the dangers of inefficient healthcare provision.
Dr. Bekelis did not participate in this analysis but mentioned that TBI patients require long-term medication and they may even suffer seizures. Changing or getting rid of their insurance could affect drastically the patient’s life, the doctor warned.
This investigation was shown to the public in the journal called JAMA surgery.
What causes patients to have TBI?
External forces that could lead to TBI include bumps to the head, a foreign object penetrating the skull, or violent bouncing or twisting of the brain inside the skull due to a rapid jolt. Concussions qualify as mild or moderate TBI.
Even mild brain injury should be taken seriously, as up to 90 percent of related deaths, emergency room visits, and hospitalizations are classified as mild cases such as concussions.
Source: Tech Times