Plastic surgeons are now offering coverage against complications to this type of procedure.
The British Association of Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS) has just announced that it will begin offering a unique type of health insurance specifically for patients who receive plastic surgery treatments through accredited surgeons.
There has not been any cosmetic surgery coverage available to patients until this time.
In the United Kingdom, there has not been any type of health insurance coverage for individuals who have undergone plastic surgery and who have experienced complications as a result of those procedures. However, this has now been changed, following an investigation into cosmetic surgery that was performed by the government. The results of that inquiry were released in April.
Following the release of the results, many changes to the health insurance and other aspects of the industry are changing.
Sir Bruce Keogh, the medical director, has made a call for an overhaul of the laws regarding the health insurance coverage and other elements of this £2.3 billion sector. Two of the primary changes that are being demanded by the report from the investigation were for coverage to be provided by cosmetic surgery clinics, and for patients to be informed of their surgeons’ success rates.
Most NHS practitioners are represented by BAAPS, and it is the only cosmetic surgery organization that conducts annual audits of the procedures that its members are conducting. In order to provide protection for all of the patients of the surgeons that are members in the association, it has now worked with Lloyd’s of London specialist health insurers to create a unique policy for this circumstance.
Since the surgeons who are members of BAAPS are all have this coverage, the patients are not required to actually purchase this special health insurance for themselves. Instead, the price of the coverage will be included within their surgery quote. The policy is being called the Aesthetic Surgery Commitment (ASC). It provides coverage for corrective treatments for all of the most commonly occurring complications to plastic surgery procedures. This not only includes bleeding and infection, but also represents a first in the world for the coverage for capsular contracture, which is an abnormal reaction that some peoples’ bodies have to breast implants.
