Has anybody else experienced this?? I purchased a well woman insurance policy many years ago over the telephone by a tele sales person. I specifically asked if it covered breast cancer as my grandmother died from this awful disease.
On being diagnosed I contacted the insurance company to make my claim. I had a full mastectomy and when my results came in my nodes were clear therefore the cancer is “insitu”. The insurance company now wont pay out as it turns out that they wont pay out unless its spread! surely, cancer is cancer!! I have lodged an appeal but wondered what other peoples experiences were with this?
Was your cancer DCIS or LCIS or was it described as something else on the pathology report? Just because it hadn’t spread to the lymph nodes doesn’t mean it was ‘in situ’. Mine was an invasive carcinoma that hadn’t spread to the lymph nodes, but it wasn’t ‘in situ’.
I think you should check with your surgeon/onc and get them to describe it. Then, if the insurance policy didn’t specifically exclude it in their small print, you should be able to win your fight with them.
Also, even if it was ‘in situ’, it is well-understood that the treatment is still quite radical because of the risk of it spreading, and any decent health insurance policy should treat it the same as an invasive carcinoma. If I were you, I would also take this up with the Office of Fair Trading and the Insurance Ombudsman.
I too had a well woman female cancer cover policy sold over the telephone many years ago.
It took a while, but they did pay out without much hassle. My policy covered any invasive female cancer & I’m so luck to have taken it out when I did!
Most policies will pay out on invasive BC whether or not it has spread to the lymph nodes. I’m unsure when you say that your cancer is insitu whether this means that it was non invasive & this is possibly the issue?
Either way I would certainly appeal…it’s always worth a shot!
Hi Deed,
I didnt have well woman cover, but critical illness.
There is a massive difference between no lymph node involvement and in situ cancer.
Most companies exclude DCIS (in situ), but any other ‘invasive’ cancer - whether lymph node involvement or not, should be a valid claim.
Good Luck
Marguerite