This post may contain affiliate links, which means if you enroll through my link, I’ll receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.
If you are looking for Sedera health reviews, you have come to the right place.
In this post, I am going to review monthly costs (range is dependent on age, individual/family memberships, and the Initial Unshareable Amount), preventative sharing, pre-existing conditions, maternity, turnaround time to pay medical bills, and any special considerations to be aware of.
About Sedera Medical Cost Sharing
Sedera’s cost-sharing solution provides affordability, choice, transparency, and support to pay for your healthcare expenses.
Medical Cost Sharing is peer-to-peer sharing of large, unexpected medical costs through a membership-based Community.
When you join Sedera, you begin contributing funds for use by other Members on a monthly basis.
Is Sedera Health Insurance?
Sedera Health is not a health insurance company. Sedera is a non profit medical cost sharing company, also known as a Health Share. Sedera is considered an affordable alternative to health insurance since the main purpose to have help with major medical expenses.
As a Health Share, Sedera is not considered minimum essential coverage and legally does not guarantee payment like a health insurance company is required to do. It’s important to remember that a health insurance plan will not cover every healthcare expense either.
Sedera will pay for a member’s eligible need. As a Health Share, members continue their membership on a month-to-month basis. This means that members can cancel at any time, which gives the Health Sharing community every incentive to take care of their members and pay for eligible medical costs.
How does Sedera Work?
With your Sedera membership, you would pay, or contribute, a set amount of money each month to the Sedera Health Share community.
When a member has a larger and unexpected medical need, the member would first need to pay a set amount, which is the member’s responsibility before the Health Share community pays any medical bills. This is similar, but not the same as, a deductible that you’d have with a Health Insurance plan.
Once the member has paid their responsibility, the Health Share would “share” in all eligible medical expenses.
What Medical Costs are the Member’s Responsibility?
The Initial Unshareable Amount (commonly referred to as the “IUA”), is the amount the member would need to pay before the HealthShare will “share” in any medical expenses. The member chooses which IUA amount they want. Typically, the larger the member’s responsibility amount is before the HealthShare “shares” in anything, the lower the monthly contribution amount.
Sedera has five IUA amounts to choose from: $500, $1000, $1500, $2500, and $5000.
How much does Sedera Cost?
Sedera members will have a monthly contribution from $113 to $1,713. The monthly costs are based on how many members are in the household, their age, and what IUA they choose.
When people choose Sedera, they find it to be an affordable alternative to traditional insurance.
What are the Requirements to Join Sedera?
Sedera Health is a medical cost sharing community that does not require a statement of faith to join.
Sedera accepts people of all faiths. It’s ideal for people who live a healthy lifestyle, want more affordable healthcare, and feel comfortable relying on the health share community rather than a health insurance company.
What Preventative Sharing is Available?
Sedera has some preventable sharing available to their members.
Routine childhood immunizations are shareable.
Diagnostic colonoscopies and Diagnostic mammograms are shareable after an IUA is paid – some sharing restrictions may apply (age, need, reasonable cost, etc).
What about Maternity Benefits?
Medical expenses for childbirth that have an expected delivery date within the first 12 months of membership are not shareable. This means that new members have to wait at least three months before they conceive in order for their maternity medical needs to be considered shareable.
Sedera has a Maternity Initial Unshareable Amount (IUA) of $5,000. The maternity IUA is not chosen by members, and is the same for everyone, regardless of what IUA you chose.
The standard maternity IUA applies to both vaginal deliveries and emergency Cesarean section deliveries.
The maternity IUA of $7,500 for non-emergency or elective Cesarean section deliveries.
This means if you were to have a baby as a Sedera member, you would pay either $5,000 or $7,500 for your maternity expenses. This can be a big expense to young growing families.
You can check out my maternity guide to learn more about the maternity benefits at all of the health shares. There are quite a few that have lower costs for members with maternity needs.
What about Pre Existing Conditions?
Sedera has some sharing limitations for pre existing conditions, similar to other medical cost sharing plans.
During the first year of membership with Sedera, there is a waiting period. This means that nothing related to the pre-existing condition is shareable in that first year.
During the second year of membership with Sedera, members would have up to $15,000 available for sharing.
During the third year of membership with Sedera, members would have up to $30,000 available for sharing.
During the fourth year of membership with Sedera, the member’s pre existing condition is now fully shareable with the community.
Turnaround Time for Paying Member’s Healthcare Costs
Sedera HealthShare will pay eligible needs for members within 30-60 days. It’s important for members to understand the needs process and to have appropriate expectations for the timeframe on having their medical needs paid for.
Considerations
Before anyone joins a medical cost sharing community, they just need to understand that this is not traditional health insurance.
Sedera offers medical cost sharing to those who strive to live a healthy lifestyle and want to share in one another’s medical expenses. Health Sharing is a great way to save money on your healthcare outside of traditional health insurance.
Sedera members are Required to join with an association, company or other grouped billing for medical needs to be shared.
Sharing Limitations
Per Sedera’s member guidelines, “No single need may consume more than one third of the total number of shares available in a given month”. This can result in a medical need being capped, but it is at an unknown amount since it is dependent on how many people contribute each month.
Do I recommend Sedera?
Sedera is a good option for those who are looking to save money and find an affordable alternative to health insurance.
You can visit Sedera’s website to learn more
I recommend looking at my article on the Best Health Share Plans. You will find which health share plans I recommend (including another non-religious health share plan) to help you on your search for affordable healthcare.
Write a Sedera Review
Are you a current or former member of Sedera? If you have any experience with Sedera, please write a review! Reading other people’s Health Share experiences is a huge when trying to make a decision about which Health Share to join. In fact, over 90% of people will read online reviews before they buy a product or service! Please consider writing a review!
They screwed us on their own tech error and wouldn’t fix it
We submitted our new baby to the portal within the 30 day window that we were instructed. This update is not auto-approved, though. It is delayed. This put us in a position where our baby was not approved in their 30 day window so they rejected all of her claims. They told us that we were supposed to call to have it approved sooner, but they never communicated that in their initial emails. My partner submitted the addition within 2 weeks of having the baby, but we did not get a confirmation email which we should have received from the system. Instead, we got an email several weeks later, on august 1st, saying that the changes made on august 2nd (???) would be approved august 3rd. However, I went through my partners browsering history and she was not on the Sedera account page on the 1st or the 2nd. This means that we did not get the email confirmation at the right time and were unable to have them change the time that our baby was added to fit in the 30 day window. They said they couldn’t accept our browsing history as proof, and we didn’t have any confirmation otherwise because the email was not sent when she completed the account change. I tried to test the email confirmation by adding a new account, and we got an email right away, but that did not happen the first time. I found it strange that the wording of the email confirmation was different the first time than the test time, but the rep I spoke to claimed that was due to a time discrepancy with a tech company they contract. This is not to mention that they are tirelessly picking apart every claim that we submit saying that we don’t have the right information. It feels like they are picking us apart over every dollar, and that we got screwed on a tech issue when we tried our best to follow the policy. There is no element of basic human decency or trust. I would not recommend this company at all.