Can a Stroke be a Reason to Have a Critical Illness Cover?

Critical illness insurance may provide you with cover if you are diagnosed with a critical illness met by your insurance’s policy definitions. There may be around seven core cases that can be found on most critical illness policies. These are: Cancer, heart attack, stroke, kidney failure, multiple sclerosis, coronary artery bypass and major organ transplant. Should you suffer from any one of these illnesses during your insurance term, a tax free lump sum may be awarded to you. Critical illness insurance may have helped one and many to step out of financial problems due to loss of income of the suffering person.

Cancer can be said to be the largest cause for critical illness claims followed by heart attack. We’ll now have a look at stroke, believed to be the third largest source of critical illness claims in the UK.

Stroke
According to the Stroke Association 1999, around 100,000 people may contract stroke each year in the UK. Due to medical strides, about 70 percent are more likely to survive this critical illness for one year. Stroke is a dangerous critical illness as it may render the suffering person disabled. Surveys demonstrate that stroke can be largest responsible cause for disability making 300,000 victims at any one time in the UK.

Moreover, as per the Stroke Association 2002, approximately 10 percent of stroke suffering victims may be of the retirement age. Also, around 33.3 percent of people suffering from this critical illness may end up being disabled. Disability can change someone’s life. Had it not been for critical illness insurance, changing needs according to a different lifestyle may not have been considered. For example, buying a car for disabled persons, accommodating the house for a wheelchair and even starting up new training for a different work. Additionally, around 33 percent of people may also die due to this critical illness after 1 year of diagnosis and attempt of treatment while others may still make a good recovery.

According to the Office for National Statistics 2005, in the year 2004, about 0.8 percent of men of all ages may have suffered a critical illness such as stroke. Additionally 0.1 percent of men aged 16-44 contracted the same disease, 0.8 percent aged between 45-64, 1.1 percent aged between 65-74 and 5.4 percent aged 75 or more all suffered from a critical illness like stroke. As for women, the results may be slightly different. In the year 2004, 0.6 percent of women of all ages suffered from stroke. Further figures showed that this critical illness also affected 0.7 percent of women of all ages, 0.2 percent aged between 16-44, 1.5 percent aged between 65-74 and 1.9 percent aged 75 or more.

Stroke can be considered as the third leading cause of critical illness claims in the UK. The percentage of a critical illness like stroke strike men much more than women as seen earlier in the article. The reason can be that men may be more vulnerable and exposed than women. Also, men may not have too much free time to have check ups regularly so that the critical illness could be detected earlier. Therefore, one possible solution may be to have a critical illness cover that can safeguard you in case you are affected by such a disease in the future.