Do you need life insurance but are worried about how hepatitis will affect you?
We understand and know how to help you.
Life insurance underwriting for Hepatitis
As part of our digestive system life insurance underwriting, hepatitis is a common health issue we encounter and help.
The key to getting life insurance for yourself is to work with an independent agency like ours that specializes in impaired risk life insurance.
That’s where we can help you. We specialize in helping people find affordable life insurance for their hepatitis A, B or C medical history.
Recent advances in medical treatment of hepatitis have led to improved underwriting offers from carriers, even if you’ve previously purchased life insurance.
Hepatitis Overview
Hepatitis is an inflammation of the liver.
There are different types of hepatitis, typically classified as Type A, Type B, and Type C hepatitis.
Other less common types of hepatitis include hepatitis D, E, Autoimmune, and more.
Underwriters are concerned about liver function tests (LFTs), scarring and the increased risk of cancer.
Hepatitis A Life Insurance
Hepatitis A is usually transmitted via a water or food source.
Life insurance is readily available for most individuals once symptoms are resolved and there are no medical problems as a result.
The best life insurance rate classes are available, assuming no other life insurance underwriting issues exist.
Hepatitis B Life Insurance
Hepatitis B can be transmitted from mother to infant, by needles, or sexually transmitted.
If the person still tests positive after 6 months, it is considered to be chronic hepatitis B.
Getting life insurance will depend on whether you are considered chronic or not, as well as the results from your liver function tests.
Hepatitis C Life Insurance
Over 70% of the people that have hepatitis C virus have no symptoms.
Many times, the first time an individual will learn that they have Hepatitis C is when they have had routine blood tests performed at the doctors or when they take their paramed exam for life insurance insurance and the tests results come back indicating elevated liver enzymes.
While there are many ways to get hepatitis C, some will affect your ability to get coverage.
If you had a blood transfusion at one point in time, received it from getting a tattoo, piercing, etc. it will be easier to get life insurance coverage than if you developed hepatitis C from using intravenous drugs for the simple reason that underwriting will be more difficult for drug use history.
What life insurance underwriters look for when underwriting hepatitis C
- When were you diagnosed with hepatitis C?
- What are the most recent levels of liver function tests? Companies want to know what your AST, ALT, and GGTP levels are. If you have elevated liver function tests, companies want to know what the levels are, and if they are progressively getting worse or improving.
- Do you drink? – If you do drink alcohol, you are probably wasting your time trying to get coverage as companies will want nothing to do with you.
- Have you had a liver biopsy done? What were the results of the liver biopsy tests?
- Have you been diagnosed as having cirrhosis?
- Have you been treated with Interferon, Ribaviron or both?
- Newer medications such as telaprevir and bocoprevir offer tremendous promise, and we have witnessed underwriting offer improvements when successfully treated with these medications.
- Have you had testing such as a liver biopsy or a sonogram completed? Underwriters look for signs of inflammation, and/or fibrosis of the liver.
- What are your current liver function test levels?
- Do you have other medical issues such as Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis?
What to expect from life insurance companies:
Best case scenarios may offer standard plus rates. This is the case when the insured has received successful treatment, and the hepatitis virus is not detectable 24 weeks after the completion of treatment.
Underwriters would also be looking for normal liver function test results, as well as confirmation usually via liver biopsy that there is no liver inflammation or fibrosis or liver damage.
After we gather your information, what we do is shop your information out to a number of life insurance carriers for consideration, which typically takes about 3 days to hear back from all companies.
The life insurance companies provide us with quick quotes, giving us an indication of pricing, and we share that information with you.
Let us hear your comments about this article. Thank you.
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