Health insurance is important because health care is expensive. The purpose of insurance, of course, is to pay for your expensive doctor visits and treatments in a more financially sound way—after all, it is extremely difficult to pay for health care out of your own pocket.

Now, of course, health insurance itself is not cheap, but insurance companies make it easier to financially manage them by establishing payment plans that you let you pay for coverage and then pay for additional needs as they are used. If you never get into an accident or your car is never stolen, for example, you can pretty much be certain to pay the same, relatively affordable amount of money every month, for your automobile.

The same goes for health insurance, for the most part: you pay monthly to have access to insurance and then for each medical service or item you need, and it always more affordable to manage your health care through insurance than to try to pay for it all yourself.

However, sometimes you do have to pay out of pocket expenses for your health care. Whether you don’t have insurance or you have exceeded your deductible, this money comes out of your pocket and will go towards paying your health care.

This can be stressful, of course, but remember that health care is an industry and as an industry doctors have a responsibility to the service and to the patient. If you have to pay any out of pocket expenses simply ask the hospital to set up a payment plan. They want to retain your service as a patient they also want to make sure that you remain healthy so making it easier for your to pay your bill ensures both sides get what they need.