There is a lot of information in both the national and local news about significant increases in health insurance premiums for individual policies.

Winthrop Quigley recently (May 17, 2010) published an interesting article in the Albuquerque Journal: Some insurance pools tend to self destruct. He explained that there is a state regulation that prohibits new younger participants from joining an older pool of individual policies. So the cost increases and you can be trapped in older policy with rapidly increasing premiums. What can you do?

Like group insurance plans, an individual policy must be reviewed and actively managed every few years. It is worth the effort to review newer policy offerings and possibly changing to a newer policy or even changing to a policy offered by another insurance company.

The biggest obstacle may be your current health. There is no guarantee that an insurer will take you on. Individual plans are medically underwritten and the insurer may reject your application or attach exclusions to your policy if you have health problems. People enrolled in individual plans pay premiums more in line with their expected health costs, so the premiums will be higher for those who are older or less healthy.

If you're faced with finding individual insurance, don't let the confusion tempt you to go without. Even if you're healthy, you could fall off a ladder or have a serious car accident and be financially ruined. Plus, you'll lose your pre-existing-conditions coverage in most states if you go without insurance for more than 63 days.

Finding the right balance of coverage and cost can be challenging, but it's a necessity. So take your search one step at a time. The first step is to evaluate your needs and understand your health insurance options. You can begin that process by completing our Individual Information Sheet.