Hassle-Free Health Coverage: Tips for Smart Shoppers Introduction

Once upon a time, people could go to any doctor they wanted. If their general practitioner decided they needed to see a specialist, they could see any specialist they pleased. If they needed medicine, they could go to any pharmacy and get exactly what the doctor ordered.

Today, we have a lot more choices, including HMOs, PPOs, generic drugs, lists of doctors we can and can't see, treatments we are allowed -- only after two or three doctors agree that its necessary.

The changes are due, in part, to skyrocketing medical costs. In fact, according to the Washington Insurance Council, in 1969 per capita expenditures for health care were about $268 per year in the United States.

By 1990, that figure jumped to nearly $2,567. During the same 20-year period, health expenditures grew from 5.3 percent of the gross national product (GNP) to 12.2 percent.

Insurers have had to eat some of these costs -- and they've had to contend with ever-increasing fees for doctors, lab tests, drugs and hospitals.

On the other hand, they have passed many of the increased costs on to you -- the consumer -- in the form of higher premiums. But there comes a time in every industry's lifecycle when it can't pass the costs on any longer and it has to do something else. It has to cut costs.

Still, you do have choices when it comes to your health insurance -- whether you are buying your own coverage or getting it through your employer.