President Obama’s law adds 8 preventive medical benefits for female patients.
As of Wednesday, the next element of the health care reforms went into place, adding coverage for eight more free preventive medical benefits for women.
These include many tests and services that had previously been paid for out of pocket.
Among the benefits that are now included due to the health care reforms are: routine breast and pelvic exam checkups, screenings for sexually transmitted infections and domestic violence, and gestational diabetes, prenatal care, breast feeding supplies, pap tests, and contraceptives.
The health care reforms that were passed in 2010 require that these services be offered by all medical insurance plans, with no cost to the policyholder. According to data released by the Department of Health and Human Services in a report on Monday showed that millions of Americans will experience an improvement in their care as a result of this change.
Approximately 47 million women have had their plans upgraded due to these health care reforms.
According to Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-Maryland) in a press conference, “Women will be able to have access to essential preventive services that will provide early detection and screening for those situations where they’re most at risk, and also provide opportunities to care and services that they need as wives and mothers”
Moreover, beyond those services for women have most recently added to their plans, there have been another 14 preventive service benefits that were previously added as a requirement by the health care reforms. These include breast cancer screenings through mammograms for women over the age of 40, as well as osteoporosis screenings for women over the age of 60, among others.
Kathleen Sebelius, the Health and Human Services Secretary, has been calling for these health care reforms for some time, and is now applauding their implementation. She explained that before the law was put into place, even the most basic women’s medical services were not covered by many insurance companies. Moreover, those that did often had copayments that were so high that many women found that the cost of the screenings and services was still prohibitive.
