Health Insurance – that’s a funny name when you think about it.  You virtually never use it when you are healthy; only when you are sick.  I’m thinking about it because I am home – sick with the flu.  I’m waiting for my primary care physician to call me back to let me know when I can visit her office.

We are owner’s of a small Real Estate Broker and Mortgage Company in Palm Springs.  Our Employee Benefits are handled by a provider that bills us for the monthly premiums for all of our insurances along with our payroll.  We are pretty vigilant about making sure we get the appropriate coverage at a good price; especially given my history of 2 major cancer bouts in the last 15 years.  Either of those would have bankrupted us without our insurance coverage.  It’s not a Cadillac plan; probably better referred to as a VW.  The coverage is within a HMO and I can honestly say I believe I have been provided every reasonable service to which I have been entitled since we have been part of this scheme.  Theoretically, we get reduced premiums because we get lumped together with a bunch of other small businesses and pre-existing conditions don’t affect the cost – only age.

Now here’s the rub.  My wife, she works with us in our business, just had what the provider refers to as a Milestone Birthday.   Apparently because she was one day older on January 27 than she was on January 26 the risk to the insurance company became so great that they needed to raise her premium by more than 30%!!  Since we don’t have an employer (other than ourselves) to pay their “portion” we get to see what it really costs – $766 each and every month for just her Illness Insurance – matching what we pay for mine.  The really scary part is I have a Milestone Birthday coming up in June and I have already been warned that my premium will jump from the aforementioned $766 to God knows what.  I suppose that since being 55 and 1 day old is 30% riskier than 54 and 364 days then turning 60 plus that one extra day probably means I will be at least 50% riskier to the insurance company than I am today.  Let’s hope not because our current premiums are more than our mortgage payment, taxes,homeowner’s dues and insurance on our home.  I could drive 3 or 4 different fancy cars for what I pay in illness insurance premiums.

In 5 short years I’ll be faced with the alphabetical decision-making that accompanies the conversion of my illness insurance to Medicare.  The more I read about Parts A through F the more confused I become.  I am not fearful that Medicare will disappear by the time I turn 65 – after all, my congressperson has promised me it won’t.  But, I am more than a little concerned that the my portion of the cost of the combination of the Affordable Health Care Act and whatever supplemental plans I will need to have will escalate to a level that provides no relief in this spiraling illness insurance cost structure.

I think thinking about this is making me sick.  When is that doctor’s office going to call me back?