Forty six insurance companies, scores of health insurance products and hundreds of advertisements and almost every company suggesting its plan as the best for your needs. While it is easy to choose a television or car, buying a financial product like health insurance can be quite intimidating for a lot of us. With minute details nicely tucked in thick policy documents and jargons that we do not understand, most of us do not even know what we are buying in the name of insurance. What is this piece of paper worth? Will it cover you against the disease that you had before buying the policy? Will it cover costs pertaining to dental or optician check up? Will it pay for the medicines you bought from the chemist store?

There are a lot of inclusions and exclusions which we don't think about while buying a policy. If these small things are not taken care of, we may end up getting a policy which turns out to be useless. Here's a simple guide to help you understand what insurance lingo actually means, and most importantly what it covers: Waiting period. Insurance companies will not cover all your claims from day one. For instance, policies do not cover pre-existing diseases.

Typically for pre-existing diseases, different companies have different waiting periods ranging anywhere from 2 to 4 years from the day the policy is purchased. Even without any pre-existing illness, usually claims arising during the first 30 days of buying the policy are not entertained. Therefore, it is better to stick to your existing policy and get it renewed than buy a new policy the next year.

Critical illness riders. While it is suggested to have cover for some critical illnesses, try to read between the lines while purchasing one such cover. Insurance companies have a limited set of diseases that are defined under critical illness and sometimes however critical you think your illness may be, it may still not be covered. While selecting the right critical illness cover, ask specifically which diseases are covered as critical illness and which are not. For example, diseases like angioplasty are not covered under critical illness. Again, the waiting period for critical illness is usually between 90 days to 120 days and you must survive for at least a month after the procedure to get the claim.

Inclusion of newborns in family floater. You may want to find out if a new born member of the family will be covered in your family floater plan. While selecting the right cover for your family, do ask if it covers infants and whether the coverage starts from the day of birth. Some insurance companies also cover for the vaccination expenses for one year or more.Annual bonus. If you are a healthy person and take care utmost care of your health, you would be interested to know if your insurer provides any incentives in the form of annual or cumulative no claims bonus or not. You can get as much as 20 per cent to 40 per cent as bonus coverage as per your claims history which varies from company to company.

Room rent. There are some health insurance policies that offer hospitalisation cover. But it is worth noting that there is only a certain amount you can claim towards a hospital room rent. Insurance companies have a cap on room rent which is usually a per cent of the annual limit per day. If you like more comfort and privacy make sure you choose an insurance product which has a higher cap on hospital room rent. Lifelong renewals. Greater the age, higher is the risk. While insurance regulator stipulates that no company can deny health insurance cover to a person, in reality a lot of high-risk people are denied cover. If you don't want to face problems while getting insurance cover in your old age, you can look at companies that offer lifelong renewals. Right now, this option is limited to a few insurers only. Most others allow renewals only till the age of 55.Medical. People who are above 45 years of age or have too high or too low BMI (body mass index) or smoke are unlikely to get a health cover without a medical test. In some cases you will have to pay some extra premium to cover additional health risk. Health cover for senior citizens. Some insurance companies have designed policies to cater to the needs of specifically the senior citizens.

This type of policy will typically cover hospitalisation and domiciliary hospitalisation (critical ailments while the patient is bedridden but not actually hospitalised because of certain reasons). OPD covers. An OPD cover takes care of all the doctor's consultation and medical expenses when the insurer is not hospitalised. It is generally offered as add on to premium policy holders. This policy can benefit people who have to consult specialists quite often. Such policies cover consultation fee and other costs as well. Health insurance has become a must for everybody. Whether you are buying it for yourself or family, do not hesitate in paying a little extra but do ensure that you and your loved ones get adequate covered.

Source : Financial Express