So I found a pretty good surgeon in my state, a good two hours away actually, who does top surgery. I was given a consultation, check up, and costs. It's a good $10k, money I just don't have, and my insurance doesn't cover it. So does anyone know of any insurance plans in MN that helps with surgery costs?

Hi Latrell,

To start - what does your insurance cover? Are you eligible to get any plans through your school? Often times the ones that universities offer are trans friendly. That would be the first route I'd tell you to look at. Other than that, you'd have to look at the Affordable Care Act Marketplace for MN and see what plans are available to you. Then limit it down to what you can afford. Then look and see which of those would cover surgery.

Is there a reason you're planning to see this particular surgeon? $10k IMO is pricey.

I wish I could help. I don't know anything about the ACA, but, as Max says, it certainly can't hurt to look into it.

What's your insurance policy? Do you get it through work, school, or some other way? What are your obvious options?

Real reason is distance, to be blunt. I don't have a car, or the money for tickets, to be going across states. Just getting to mpls alone, not taking the northstar, is a good $100 cause of finding a hotel room. A good hotel room is a good $80 for just one night and then I gotta get home so that's around $100-$120 just for a day. Money I simply don't have atm. If I do get a car, I'm looking elsewhere just to be sure.

I'll look into other plans and stuff cause I'm very new to actually paying for it. I was told I can finance it through Care Credit, but I don't even have credit period so that's not an option.

i really don't know anything about insurance, but i used to travel a lot between countries and states and couchsurfing.com website is very neat. it'd get you stay at a local for a few days without a fee. for how long and where or whom you choose to stay with depends on negotiation with the person of your choice. it's more like having a new friend at a new area. going out to see what the locals have to offer, something like that. it should cut your hotel stay a lot if you decide to go to a different state to do top surgery. hope to hear some good news ^^

You don't really need a credit score for care credit. The catch is you will be really in debt if you fail to pay the bill on time.

Keep in mind that even if you get insurance that will cover surgery, you'll still be responsible for deductibles and out of pocket costs. As a point of reference, I have a mid-level (Silver) plan through my employer. I pay $38 per paycheck towards the cost of my insurance premium. My out of pocket maximum is $4000 for in-network coverage and $6000 for out-of-network coverage. So depending on which doctor I see, which hospital/facility I have to procedure performed at, etc. I am responsible for $4,000 at a minimum and potentially $6,000 if the doctor or hospital are out of network.

I'd strongly recommend starting to build your credit now. Lots of banks have credit cards for students with very low credit lines that they increase over time as your score improves. It is probably the best thing you could do for yourself at this point. Surgery is expensive, and not just the price of the procedure. The surgeon I saw was an hour away from home, but I still had to stay in her city overnight and return a week later to have my drains removed. So that was $100 for a hotel room, $30 for gas for both trips, and $25 for food for myself and my partner during the overnight stay and the day trip a week later. There were also supplies I needed that weren't provided by the surgeon's office (bandages, gauze, anti-bacterial ointment, etc.).

Everyone qualifies for CareCredit. But I'd be wary of financing something if you don't have any income. Along with getting a starter credit card, my recommendation for you is twofold:

- Spend more time researching surgeons and see if there are other options in a certain mile radius that would work for you. $10k is exorbitant for top surgery IMO. Surgeons who are regarded as the best to go to in the country do not charge that much. Somewhere in the realm of $7-9k is what I would expect to see as a base price from a known surgeon.

- When you fill out financial aid paperwork next, take more than what you need to pay for school expenses. Put this in a savings account for top surgery. Student loan debt is better to have than credit card debt. This would enable you to afford surgery, traveling, and incidentals. If you can get away with the whole amount at once, go for it. I don't remember if they cap it at a certain amount per semester. In grad school I took an extra $6k one semester and lived on it while I worked on my thesis. A lot of people do this to off-set their rent or food expenses while in school. Why not use it for surgery if you'd be seeking out a financing option anyway?

As an added note, I do not have deductibles but I do have copays, and unless you have really good insurance you probably won't get out of them. Even if top surgery manages to be covered just as much as any other surgery you might still have to spend 250 - 1000 dollars to cover the rest (if you do not have a deductible, that's what I've seen).

I thought I saw carecredit required one to earn at least 1500 dollars per month (which probably not too many full-time students are making) though maybe I'm wrong.

I've basically been saving the money I have received from working and limiting my expenses in small ways in order to save up even with my insurance offering coverage.

I have pretty good trans-supportive insurance through Blue Shield here in California. Here is a snapshot of my costs.

If I do everything through the main network--the tier that they call "select"--then the system is a lot like an HMO, and I pay a modest copay for routine services. The copay for hysto through the select providers would have been $1500, which would have been offset by any copays and charges I had paid into the system so far.

Unfortunately, my surgeon was in the second tier of providers, and the second tier works more like a PPO. (I've been getting all of my services this year through the second tier because that's the system I was in when my employer switched out my insurance coverage.) So the copay for his hysto was $3000, offset by the thousand dollars or so in copays and charges I had already paid into the system. I'm expecting a hysto bill for somewhere around $2000.

In addition, I pay almost $100 in premiums every month. So if I'd done all of my services and my hysto through the first tier, I believe that I would have paid out $2600-2700 dollars in premiums and copays during the year to get the surgery. This amount would not count pharmacy or associated costs, of course.

I understand that I can get travel costs and accommodations covered if I have to leave town for a procedure. For example, all of that should be covered for bottom surgery if I go to Dr. Crane up north. But I had the hysto here in town.

If I had gone completely out of the network, I'm not sure what my coverage would have been. Maybe 50% after the deductible? That's how I get my therapist covered, but I'm not sure whether medical works the same way as mental health under this plan.

Awesome info in this thread, a lot of solid financial/insurance stuff that I either didn't know or hadn't ever occurred to me. Thanks for taking the time to lay down some knowledge, guys.

I was looking at a certain top surgery website (I don't want to post the name/address and get in trouble or anything due to my low post count), and on one of the surgeon's profiles they mentioned United Medical Credit and iCare Financial, in addition to Care Credit. I don't know if all doctors accept those other two plans, or how they compare to Care Credit, but wanted to just throw'em out there in case you want to research them. Best of luck, I hope everything works out for you!