As a normal person with average weight and seemingly good health, one never expects any such major health issues to occur in their early 30s. Prior to this, personal insurance or medical cards seemed like an additional expense and had been ignored. The only coverage I had was from a group insurance and medical card from the company I was working at. It's not just about dollars and cents but if you take that into account, this is what 6 months had cost me (bare in mind its an estimated cost of what I can remember, excluding all the Chinese remedies, therapies and supplements directly related to this even prior to surgery)
Even if the group insurance covered RM15K and SOCSO covered RM7K of the spinal fusion, there is still a whopping RM10K you have to cover on your own, while not being able to work and reimbursement from SOCSO does not come the next day.
2 years spent struggling to cover this amount was not easy especially when your immune system is weak from so much antibiotics, pain killers and muscle relaxants. This means that prior to this I have hardly had any fevers and catch coughs or colds from anyone. After that it seems that even if someone sneezed in Singapore, I would have a cold! I was lucky my former employer was willing to give me an interest free loan.
The most awful truth is that since I had no existing insurance coverage on my own, no insurance company will touch me now after the fusion. Its not like they are willing to offer you a sick premium of 5K a month... they flat out reject your application. So the one most important thing I have learned in life is that you should not neglect being insured when you are healthy because hey... no one expected a disc to collapse after 30 years without even being in a major accident!
Pay while you are healthy cause truly, you never know when the shit hits the fan.
