As if traumatic brain injury wasn't painful enough, you are also likely to change or lose your private health insurance if recent U.S. analysis is to be believed.
Researchers analyzed a period of three years and found that depending upon the severity of brain injury, people often lost or modified their health insurance.
Since most participants got their health insurance cover from their employers, a change in coverage was also due to a change in job, said the study authors in a research letter in JAMA Surgery.
"Individuals who were the primary policy holder might have lost coverage because they were unable to continue in their job and became unemployed/uninsured," co- author Eric Schneider of Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston said.
As many as 2.5 million ER visits are due to traumatic brain injuries. The research team also discovered that as many as 280,000 hospitalizations happen due to TBI. As 40 percent survivors of traumatic brain injuries lead to disability, it can also affect their ability to work, noted the researchers.
For people who are suffering from Traumatic Brain Injury, it is imperative to receive continued healthcare, as the treatment is required long after the injury happens, said Dr. Kimon Bekelis, neurosurgeon and an instructor at The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice in Lebanon, N.H.
"Some of these patients receive prolonged rehabilitation, whereas others require frequent hospitalizations and multiple re-operations," said Bekelis, who was part of the study team.
Many patients have to undergo expensive long-term medication, Bekelis said. "A potential interruption of insurance coverage for these patients and their dependents can have catastrophic consequences," she said. "These findings should alert policy makers, payers, physicians, and patients for this unrecognized and potentially dangerous source of inefficient healthcare delivery."
Schneider said that for the patients with deeper brain injuries, long-term treatment can make a huge difference in their recovery.
"This suggests that having continuous coverage may be most important to patients with the most severe injuries; however, in our study, these are the severely injured individuals who were the quickest to change (or lose) their pre-injury coverage," he said.
