#insurance #medical #health I have been on Kaiser since started working in US but we pay a lot through my husband employer plan and now we can see a better plan through my employer for Blue cross. I am just wondering how good are they ? With Kaiser I can dial a number in the middle of night and get medical advice if needes or directes to urgent care also I can send messages to my doctor and get response same day amd if she/he is out of office other Kaiser doctor will respond ....so I'm wondering if similar experience can be achieved with Blue cross or not ? Specially that we have kids and lots of time they get sick and you need advice over phone or email outside usual business hours
In my experience, Kaiser treats you like a number, whereas you’ll develop a personal relationship ship with your doctors with Blue Cross. However, if you’re healthy and have no health issues, Kaiser will be the easiest option. Like the other person said, they suck for specialty care.
Also Kaiser could mean longer drive times to get to an office. And Kaiser is also a really bad idea if you ever want any support for mental health and wellness.
Kaiser is if you don’t need medical care.
Basically Kaiser is very predictable and you get everything through their network. But if you need to see any kind of specialist the wait times and referrals can be more difficult and you’ll have more hoops to jump through. Blue Cross likely has a more open network and will negotiate with you if you want to see an out of network doctor. The quality of blue cross may depend on the kind of restrictions your company builds in through negotiations. For example, I once worked at a place that required all employees who wanted weight loss surgery to go through the Kaiser plan and didn’t cover the surgery at all through the ppo plan which was Blue Cross Overall if your family is healthy and you don’t often have to see a specialist Kaiser will have more predictable costs and structure Also, with Kaiser you’ll always have to travel to a Kaiser facility or pharmacy. This can be a pain depending on where you live. I have ppo now but when I lived in California always lived near a Kaiser facility so it wasn’t an issue for me but could be for you. Lots of people swear by Kaiser but many people hate it. It wasn’t for me because I have some specialty care health issues and Kaiser doesn’t deal with that well and has stringent guidelines for triage