When it comes to providing healthcare, colleges are like anyone else. They want to get paid.
For years, colleges have offered healthcare service at student health centers. Now many are requiring students to carry their own healthcare insurance.
Uninsured students “became a problem for me and other folk who do (student health),” said Thomas Parham, assistant vice chancellor of counseling and health services at University of California, Irvine.
“So a campaign was begun to raise awareness of the impact inadequate healthcare has, particularly (on) those students who have major medical expenses,” Parham said.
UC Irvine, along with other UC campuses, started requiring undergraduates to carry health insurance in 2000, Parham said.
Graduate students have had to carry health insurance for more than a decade or so, he said.
Before the requirement, about half of the students who came to UCI’s student health center were uninsured. UCI has 24,120 students.
The UC Board of Regents’ moved to require insurance after a retention study showed that unexpected medical bills were a leading cause of students dropping out, said Steven Beckley, a health insurance broker and consultant from Fort Collins, Colo.
|
|
Parham: issue “be-came a problem for me” |
UCI even offers insurance to students. The school offers what Parham called a preferred provider organization through Nationwide Life Insurance Co. of Columbus, Ohio.
The plan has a gatekeeper,the student health center,to help keep costs down, according to Parham.
“So, you just can’t sign up for a service or whatever without being seen by the primary physician, first of all,” he said.
Undergraduate students now pay $600 a year for the coverage. UCI is working on its 2005-2006 contract, Parham said.
Students are taking the coverage in “higher proportions,” Parham said.
The university system requires students to have some sort of coverage, either from the school, their parents or an outside provider.
California State University, Fullerton, the county’s largest college at 33,400 students, doesn’t require attendees to carry health insurance, said Paula Selleck, a university spokeswoman.
Any decision to do so would have to be made by the California State University system, she said.
Cal State Fullerton students can buy coverage through a CSU health plan underwritten by Mega Life and Health Insurance Co. of Texas.
The plan, offered through the school’s Associated Students organization, is available to all registered undergraduates who take six credits or more.
Cal State Fullerton charges $577 a year for health insurance for students under the age of 25. In the fall, the school plans to switch to Blue Cross, Selleck said. That plan is set to cost $775 a year.
The average age of Cal State Fullerton students is 25. For most policies, dependent coverage through a parent ends at 23.
Besides insurance, students who pay $25 a year can access the campus health center, Selleck said.
Chapman University in Orange, the county’s other major college, has required undergraduate students to carry health insurance since the early 1990s, said Joe Kertes, the university’s dean of students.
Chapman has 5,100 students.
The school charges its students per semester,they pay $179 for $10,000 worth of coverage or $263 for $30,000 worth of coverage. As with Cal State Fullerton, Mega is Chapman’s carrier.
Nationally, some 90% of private colleges in the U.S. with more than 1,000 students require them to have health insurance, according to insurance broker Beckley. A quarter of public universities with more than 10,000 students have insurance requirements, he said.
PacifiCare Health Systems Inc., the Cypress-based health plan operator, offers a policy for UCI graduate students. But the company doesn’t offer a policy for undergraduate students, said Cheryl Randolph, a company spokeswoman.
UnitedHealthCare of Minneapolis and several Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans, including Indianapolis-based Anthem Inc., offer student plans.
