Hi evereyone,
Last year I thought about changing the mandatory and extra health insurances policies but the deadline for mandatory was too close and the extra was already 1 month late. This year, I will do it on time 
While I get price quotes and read T&Cs, please share your experiences with the Telmed health insurance model in Switzerland.
I have a mixed model with Visana - I can either see any doc at a cabinet or call their telmed line.
Works really well:
-Telmed lines simply records any recurring checks
-If it’s a new case Telmed will have a doc call me and even issue a medical certificate if needed
I am happy 
I understand that it is not good to change extra health insurance because you usually can’t get it as good as u got it first time…
I don’t know, @zuzi666. I’ve never changed our supplemental and also have not used it much (knock on wood!). What if we need it in the future? It’s not cheap, and I wonder whether now - 14 years after our arrival - we would be accepted into another supplemental insurance.
I was denied additional insurance due to an existing issue. But in the end it worked out ok as I just bought an upgrade when I had to go to hospital and for all other items I never encountered something that could not be done as I only have basic insurance.
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Yeah, if the main reason you want the supplemental is to ensure a private room in hospital it’s usually possible to just pay the extra. Treatment-wise, I’ve always worked on the assumption that anything not covered is firmly within the realms of pseudo-medicine anyway, “alternative” therapies and suchlike.
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I use additional insurance for routine massages (I have back ache often), new glasses or contact lenses, annual full body check, sport membership, etc…so far it has always worked good with Helsana.
I almost wanted to excluded the “choosing the hospital” but was last year happy I didn’t exclude it and was able to chose the hospital where I wanted to go (in another canton then…)
Anyone interested in this should double-check the fine print and policy of the hospital before agreeing to it. I was in hospital recently and asked about a private room. The hospital quoted not only the daily rate for the room upgrade, but said that the surgeon can also tack on a fee (pauschal?) and to verify how much the extra charge would be before I agreed to the upgrade. I opted not to go for a private room.
Don’t ask me why the surgeon can charge two different rates when he/she does the same operation, regardless of what type of room I choose.
That’s shocking. Hope you are feeling better.
One of my kids was in hospital at the weekend and there were three other people in the room. He said he didn’t sleep at all as nurses were coming and going at all hours attending to all the different patients needs.
I guess a private room is nice but whether you need one depends on your needs and ability to manage the discomfort of sharing.
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I have semi private as the cost of private was prohibitive for us adults - kids are private.
I have it not so much for the room but for the free choice of doctor.
For the room another watch out is that if they are running low, even if you pay they may not give you one as they want to give precedence to private and semi private patients.
Does anyone have one of those new models that are flexible and where you can choose each time whether you go public, semi or private? Been toying with the idea of changing to one of those.
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