Episode Details

Many people are looking beyond traditional health insurance to faith-based healthcare sharing ministries. ⛪️

Not only can you stand up for the healthcare values you believe in, but you can often save money too.

Since the Affordable Care Act requires health insurance to cover pre-existing conditions, traditional heath insurance premiums have skyrocketed🚀 Participating in a healthcare sharing ministry is often much less expensive than traditional insurance because these groups CAN make exclusions for pre-existing conditions!

So what options are available? Here's a quick comparison of 4 popular Christian-based sharing ministries. This is great place to start your research.

Resources:

Traditional Health Insurance Shopping Info by State - Written info from Take Command Health

How to Save Money on your Health Insurance - Podcast

Ministry Sharing Guidelines:

Medi-Share - Christian Care Ministries (CHM) Guidelines

Samaritan Ministries Guidelines

Christian Healthcare Ministries (CHM) Guidelines

Liberty HealthShare Guidelines

Here's our list of Pros/Cons/Noteworthy points per ministry…

Medi-Share by Christian Care Ministry (CCM):

Pros:

• No annual, per-incident, per-person or per-lifetime sharing caps

• Free 24/7 access to virtual providers via MDLIVE
• Bill Negotiation
• Simple, Easy-to-understand Guidelines

Cons:

• More per-visit fees: $35 per doctor visit or hospital visit, $135 for emergency room visit
• Services outside of network adjusted to "usual and customary charges" - may not all be covered
• Does not work in Montana

Noteworthy:

• More options for a higher "Annual Household Portion" (like a deductible) than some available - maybe offset by higher overall cost/fees?
• Separate Senior Assist program available - like an extension (not supplement) of Medicare Parts A & B

Medi-share Pricing Calculator - Link

Medi-share - Request Info Link

Please note: We use Media-share personally and thus know more about this ministry than some of the others. See what people are saying about other sharing options below.

Samaritan Ministries:

Pros:

• Broader range of expenses allowed for sharing such as Chiropractic and Homeopathic care
• $300-1,500 sharing threshold per member

Cons:

• Seems to have more conditions and small things to pay attention to - they have made a nice effort to simplify with some visual breakdowns in the PDF version of their guideli