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hey everyone victoria desano here and if
you are self-employed or just looking
for some different health insurance
options i'm going to run through some
really cool options today that you have
probably never heard of and that can
probably save you a good amount of money
but before i dive in if you can give
this video a thumbs up and subscribe to
my channel i would greatly appreciate
that
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so i really wanted to make this video
because of my own personal experience
being self-employed and i know that
there are a ton of people out there
especially in the u.s where i'm located
that um people that have transferred
over to being self-employed this year or
last year due to the pandemic they tried
out being in the gig economy for the
first time ever and realized that wow
our health insurance here in the us is
really heavily tied to our employment in
a corporation or a bigger business and
when you go solo or you are in the gig
economy or you're self-employed
it's a little bit tricky to find options
that are going to work for you that
aren't going to literally cost you an
arm and leg so i'm going to run through
six different insurance options some of
which you probably know of and some of
which you've probably never heard of and
show you a little bit about how you can
combine some of these to get the best
results for you and save a lot of money
in the long run i'm also going to share
some really awesome resources that can
save you money on a ton of different
medical procedures and things like that
too uh so stick around to the end where
i can share all my tips and tricks about
how i save money on my medical bills
so the first health insurance option is
the traditional healthcare marketplace
option you know the ones that you guys
are probably the most familiar with and
these are you know usually can be
subsidized if you're only making a
certain amount so this might be a great
option for if you are just starting out
self-employed and you're not
anticipating making a ton of money this
upcoming year or whenever you're
applying for this health insurance and
you can get a decent government subsidy
where you can you know where the cost of
your monthly premiums can be greatly
reduced by utilizing some subsidy from
the government so most of these
traditional marketplace plans you know
can vary a lot in what you pay even with
the subsidies so obviously you want to
choose something that's going to be best
suited for your lifestyle
the medications you need and all of that
so it's important to really you know
choose specifically on those things and
look at what's going to be covered
and all that good stuff personally i
chose an hmo
just because i love the medical group
that i'm a part of and oftentimes it's a
lot cheaper of premiums to go with an
hmo but if you love to be able to have
the freedom to choose a bunch of
different providers in the area
ppo is generally going to be your best
option to do so without having to pay
out of network fees because with hmo
you're traditionally just paying for the
in-network and if you want to go out of
network it's really expensive so ppo if
you want to kind of venture into that
realm that's what that means so just a
little terminology if you're not
familiar either way this is a great
option for just people again starting
out in the self-employed economy or gig
economy and just trying to get their
footing and figuring out a plan that's
going to work for them when they're not
making all that much money to start with
now if you are making a decent amount of
money as a self-employed individual or
if you're in the gig economy
and you're making you know upwards of
fifty thousand dollars a year you're
gonna wanna go for you know a private
health insurance company and it's to
cost you a little bit more you can still
choose you know a plan that's going to
be a lower deductible
but might have
you know higher monthly premiums because
of that or you can choose a plan that
has lower monthly premiums but you have
you know really high deductible or high
out of pocket expense so it kind of just
depends again on your lifestyle there's
a lot of different ways to tweak that
equation and figure out what works best
for you so those are probably the two
most familiar you know options that a
lot of us know about because that's you
know the private health insurance
companies those are usually what are
contracted with when we are working for
an employer so you know big companies
that we know of like blue cross blue
shield cigna et cetera those are the
ones we know about because they're
usually ones that are contracted with
those employers and we're familiar with
them now there are some lesser known
options that i'm a really really big fan
of of either using independently or in
conjunction with some certain other
health insurance options that can really
be advantageous to you and save you a
lot of money in the long run and still
get you really great coverage
one of these options is called direct
primary care and direct primary care or
dpc is basically a system in which
there's a clinic and you pay you know
instead of paying the health insurance
companies you're paying a monthly kind
of
fee or membership to this clinic in
exchange for almost unlimited primary
care services so you'll get you know
your immunizations your checkups your
physicals
blood panels a lot of minor procedures
and things like that can be covered so
kind of like your basic wellness and
primary care needs can be covered
through dpc clinics direct primary care
can be a really great option if you have
a large family and a lot of young kids
and they're always getting sick and
you're always having to have doctor's
visits and taking them in and you know
racking up those co-pays
direct primary care really makes it
affordable for families to join because
typically they'll be like an individual
fee of like 75 for the month and then if
you add your whole family it's only 125
or 140 dollars a month for the entire
family to be added and to be able to use
that clinic for all their primary care
needs without any additional expenses
added on for primary care which is
pretty great again if you have little
kids a lot of these clinics too allow 24
7 access to the doctors you can schedule
remote visits over your phone um which i
think can be really helpful if you're
like a new parent and you're kind of
just a little precautious and maybe your
kid bumped something in their knee on
something and you're worried that they
broke something and you just want a
quick eval with a doctor it's just a
really great accessible way to make that
that
you know to cut out the middleman of the
insurance company in the process and be
able to just truly have a really great
caring relationship with your primary
care physician and again the monthly
membership for these things is very low
in comparison to what you pay for health
insurance however the downfall is that
you could have a big accident or you
know have an injury in a sport or
something like that and that's not going
to be covered at a dpc clinic so even
though you're paying that membership fee
of let's say like a 75 monthly fee to
the dpc clinic to have all your primary
care needs covered you're not
necessarily going to have all of your
emergency needs covered and those kind
of bigger procedural things that you
know can happen and that's why i'm a big
fan of combining direct primary care
with ancillary insurance
ancillary insurance is honestly really
awesome i didn't really learn too much
about it until last year and i wish i
had learned about it sooner because it
probably could have saved me a lot of
money in the long run
but ancillary insurance is something
where you get a policy like
accident and illness policy or accident
injury policy and then a critical
illness policy or things that are
smaller individual policies based on
your risk so for me for example
i'm an athlete
i had an acl injury a few years ago i'm
pretty scared of re-tearing that knee
that acl ligament and i really want to
cover my butt in case i do have another
injury of some sort that's going to
require a lot of mris and surgery and
things like that because it's expensive
and having something like an ancillary
injury policy where you pay anywhere
from fifteen to thirty dollars a month
and get covered up to ten thousand
dollars that's pretty good in case you
get you know in an accident or something
where you really are gonna need to have
to meet like a lot of out-of-pocket
expenses right on your own so having
something like direct primary care and
an ancillary you know critical illness
or
accident policy can be really beneficial
and you're still only paying about you
know on average between the two of them
let's say a range of 100 to 150 per
month
so speaking of the combination so having
ancillary insurance like i mentioned in
direct primary care can be
a coverage option
there are some blind spots to it like if
you
have an emergency that is going to cost
you more than ten thousand dollars or
whatever your coverage limit is with
that ancillary option so what i did this
year is that i chose to have a
commercial
health insurance option like blue cross
blue shield and chose a an option that
has a lower monthly premium but a pretty
significantly high deductible and out of
but combining that with ancillary
insurance like for me again my biggest
worry is having another injury happen
where i'm gonna have to pay up to that
amount of the out of pocket which is
pretty high around you know 8 700
so if i get my ancillary policy and i'm
paying an additional 15 to 30 dollars a
month for that
and that covers up to 10 000 then i'm
basically covering whatever my out of
pocket has the potential to be if i get
injured and i have to pay out of pocket
eighty seven hundred dollars to hit that
amount and then my health insurance is
fully covered with blue cross blue
shield at that point i still had to pay
8 700 which is a lot right i can submit
all those claims to my ancillary health
insurance company and if those get
approved i get reimbursed for all those
out of pocket expenses associated to
that injury so it's a pretty sweet deal
if you can find a you know a direct
primary care relationship that you like
or a commercial health insurance that
maybe has a lower monthly premium but a
higher out of pocket and then combine
that with doing something like an
ancillary health insurance
another option that i don't think a lot
of people know about is something called
the health sharing ministry now this one
it typically will have some sort of
religious affiliation so if you're not
within your faith or
practicing a certain type of religion
this might not be for you because there
are certain stipulations that you know
for certain ones that i know in the
christian faith um like samaritan
ministries you know you have to have a
pastor sign off on something saying that
you attended church and certain things
like that but it is a lot cheaper than
traditional health insurance
it does not cover a lot of primary care
stuff but it does cover you know a lot
of the emergency stuff so that is a much
cheaper option but again taking into
account that it doesn't cover primary
care that might be something that you'd
want to combine again with doing a
health sharing ministry
uh in combination with something like a
direct primary care membership where you
pay a certain fee to get access to your
primary care provider at any point and
then you know have all your emergencies
and the bigger things covered through
that cost sharing ministry or health
sharing ministry so that's another
option of how you can combine things and
save money with your health insurance as
well
and then lastly this isn't necessarily
like a full option but it does give you
some time if you are in transition
between jobs and you're not really sure
what you're doing for health insurance
and you need you'd still need some
coverage you still need to buy yourself
some time and that's short-term health
insurance this is something that i had
gone on before for i think a period of
like six months and it was still pretty
good coverage um it still covers the
basics and uh that's something that you
can get through multiple you know
companies but that one's a little bit
trickier and i definitely recommend
going through an agent if you're gonna
do short-term health insurance because
there's a lot of like individualization
and personalization that goes on in that
process that i think an agent can really
help you with but again that's a great
option if you just need to buy yourself
some time you're trying to figure things
out you can have that short-term option
until you know something else kicks in
with an employer or something kicks in
with cobra or any of those options it's
just something to look into that's a
good interim okay so that's pretty much
as far as i'll go with the actual health
insurance options out there but i do
want to share a little bit about some
really cool ways that i've been able to
save money on my medical bills now and
you know moving forward not necessarily
retroactively because you know with my
knee surgery like those things already
happen but now i know there's a lot of
better options out there
so number one is md save and i have used
mdsave to cross-reference the actual
price of a lot of procedures of mris
because here's what happens is a lot of
the times when you will go in and let's
say you break something or you
something's hurting in a joint and you
need to get some scans done whether
that's a ct scan or an x-ray or an mri
they're going to send you and refer you
either within the medical network or to
the hospital and those prices are going
to be pretty insane
if you have insurance you may have good
coverage on that but you still might
need to pay like upwards of
200 250 for an mri
which might be expensive for you so
there's other options out there and you
can go to different clinics and just pay
a cash pay price and say hey i'm not
going to you know use my insurance i'm
just going to prepay or do cash pay and
oftentimes there's places that do mris
for much cheaper than what you'll get
billed from your insurance by so
mdsave will kind of give you what those
prices are and where you can go and you
can cross-reference with your health
insurance and be like is it going to be
cheaper for me to just use my health
insurance or is it going to be cheaper
for me to go through md save find a
clinic that's doing it cheaper and pay
independently this cash price and this
has saved me a lot of money and a lot of
my clients too because i've recommended
this for them
things like colonoscopies and
mammograms and things like that that
might not be fully covered for you like
especially if you're under the age that
they recommend you getting those but you
know maybe for whatever reason
you needed to get one as a screening or
you know something like that it's really
great to be able to have a resource that
you can pay a lower amount and you know
also just kind of know for reference
what those prices are to begin with
because there's not a lot of price
transparency in the
medical
billing community if you know what i
mean so it's really great to be able to
see those prices for yourself i'll drop
that link for md save down below and you
can check that out
the next tool that i have found
incredibly helpful and has probably
saved me
thousands of dollars at this point is uh
good rx and goodrx you can actually
download the app or you can you know
submit your address online they'll send
you an actual physical card it's for
saving on your prescriptions because a
lot of these companies year to year will
change their you know what they're
covering the health insurance companies
will change what they're covering in
terms of drugs and if you were on a
medication for a long time or let's say
you take insulin and something changes
in your coverage and all of a sudden
that price of insulin goes crazy high
for you and you're not able to afford
that that's scary because that's a
life-saving drug for you if you're a
diabetic so that's why i recommend good
rx is because you can actually use these
as coupons at the pharmacy and often
times when i go to pick up a
prescription and it's you know higher
than i'd like it to be i'll
cross-reference it on goodrx and i'll
say hey can you actually not run through
my insurance can you re-run this
prescription through using this coupon
on my phone
and they'll do it and it'll be a lot
cheaper and i'll save a ton of money so
even if you go to your pharmacy and
they've already ran it through and
you're checking out and they're saying
like hey that'll be sixty dollars
you can say hey give me a second i'm
gonna check goodrx and see if you can
rerun it through with this coupon and
they'll do it for you which is amazing
so goodrx has definitely been a
lifesaver in terms of the cost of
prescriptions
and lastly the last tool that i'll use
because we haven't talked about dental
insurance yet is something called
dentalplans.com and traditional dental
insurance typically for self-employed
individuals isn't super great i've had
not such a great time using traditional
dental insurance with my provider
usually they're not covering a lot of
things that you know like the full
amount of cleanings and x-rays and
things that i need and especially if you
have anything where you need a cavity
filled or anything more than the usual
it's basically not covered under most
dental insurance companies so
dentalplans.com is a really affordable
website where you can go sign up for a
plan
and it's you know i think anywhere
around like 175 for the whole year and a
lot of the prices are reduced for like a
cavity filling and you're you're
cleaning so instead of paying like 200
for a cleaning it can drop down to like
30 the cavity filling can drop down to
50 so it's really really a great option
instead of your traditional dental
insurance so it's a really really great
option instead of the traditional dental
insurance to look into dentalplans.com
and see what they have to offer and see
if it lines up for what you're needing
and it can save you thousands of dollars
on these more expensive
procedures like if you have to get
veneers or root canal or anything bigger
like that it can save you a ton of money
and you can use it as soon as you
activate it so the day that you activate
your plan there's no wait period a lot
of dental insurance plans you'll have
like a six-month wait period where if
you you know start in sign up today you
have to wait six months until you can
actually benefit from anything or use it
for anything which is kind of ridiculous
so with dentalplans.com you can do it
right away and be able to utilize it as
soon as possible
and lastly this brings me to my last
resource in terms of dental work and
things like that too a lot of dentist
offices are now starting to do
membership plans so instead of you know
taking insurance you pay almost like the
direct primary care model i was talking
about before you pay the dental office a
yearly membership fee which is
oftentimes much cheaper than what you'd
be paying for dental insurance to begin
with and you'll get for that yearly
membership fee you'll get like two
cleanings included two sets of x-rays
you know unlimited examinations if you
need those um a huge discount on any
kind of dental procedures so that's
another great option that i feel like a
lot of people don't know about you know
the dentists are offering these days too
all right guys that's all i got i really
hope this was useful for you and that
you were able to get some good
information find some ways to save money
if you're self-employed and are trying
to figure out the medical system and
health insurance and all that i hope i
provided some different options for you
that are going to line up with your
needs and i really hope this was helpful
because i'm a big fan of patient
advocacy and trying to make medicine
affordable for everybody especially if
you're self-employed so thanks guys for
watching and before you tune off if you
can give this video a thumbs up and
subscribe to my channel i would be super
appreciative so i can keep making
awesome content like this for you guys
alright take care
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