Getting Life and Disability Insurance when you're living with Sleep Apnea

Getting Life insurance while living with Sleep Apnea

Sleep Apnea is a condition where your breathing stops and starts while you sleep. In Australia, an estimated 5% of the population has sleep apnoea, translating into approximately 1 in 20 Australians being affected.

While sleep apnea isn't usually classed as a life-threatening condition, it’s seen as a pre-existing health condition and so requires some additional information when you're applying for life insurance or disability insurance, so the underwriter can better understand what you're living with.

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Not being sure if you can get life insurance can make you lose sleep

For those folks living with sleep apnea, good sleep is a precious commodity in short supply.

For those navigating life and work with sleep apnea, the level of daily disruption is rarely the same for any two people. It can range from a minor inconvenience, to suffering sudden microsleeps, to a severe sleep robbing condition requiring the need to sleep with the aid of a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) machine.

Understanding your AHI reading

Your Apnea-Hypopnea Index (AHI) reading is the number of ‘apneas and hypopneas’ that occur during your sleep. This number forms the basis for a life insurance underwriters assessment of your insurability.

• The AHI reading indicates the severity of an individuals sleep apnea (ie: the temporary cessation of breathing) by counting the number of apneas and hypopneas (ie: abnormally shallow or reduced breathing,) during a persons sleep.
• A normal AHI is considered less than 5 events per hour, while severe AHI is more than 30 events per hour.

Understand what type of Sleep Apnea you’re living with

It's important to understand there are two main types of Sleep Apnea, with the most common being Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA).

• Obstructive and Mixed Apnea is where the airway is intermittently blocked during sleep, and is usually more manageable for life insurance, with options available depending on your level of compliance with your treatment plan.
• Central Sleep Apnea (CSA) is where the brain fails to signal the body to breathe, and this may be more difficult for most insurance companies to work with.

Can I get life insurance while living with Sleep Apnea?

With the right specialist life insurance advisor, usually the answer is Yes.

If you’re living with Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA), you may be able to secure life insurance, depending on the severity of your condition, any complications you may have had, and the consistent treatment you’re on. It will also depend on any other pre-existing medical conditions that may have developed over time too.

How do insurance underwriters view Sleep Apnea?

Sleep apnea can potentially affect life insurance premiums because life insurance providers view sleep apnea a pre-existing medical condition that can lead to other health complications such as heart disease, high blood pressure, and stroke.

Getting ready for a Life Insurance application

• Know the approximate date of your original diagnosis
• Know your current AHI sleep index number
• Be able to explain the degree it impacts your day-to-day living, and
• Get ready to supply the last 90-days of your CPAP machine data.

Know your AHI Sleep Index Number

The AHI number is a measure of how many times breathing stops during sleep in an hour.
When preparing for a life and disability insurance application when you’re living with an OSA diagnosis, you will be required to:

• Share your most recent sleep study result
• Disclose your Apnea-Hypopnea Index (AHI) number (to indicate your oxygen saturation levels while sleeping), and
• Supply the last 90 days of the CPAP machine recorded data to confirm you’re using the machine at least 80% of the time.

It's important to understand sleep apnea can impact your overall health and life expectancy.

This is because the condition places a lot of stress on your heart over time, which may result in high blood pressure, irregular heartbeats, or even heart failure in serious cases. Additionally, those dips in oxygen supply to the body, while you sleep, can damage blood vessels and increase your risk of having a stroke.

Many people are unaware that according to the governments Austroads Website & National Transport Commission, who set the acceptable health standards for drivers, cite paragraph 8.3 Medical standards for licensing indicate:

'A person is not fit to hold an unconditional licence:
• if the person has an established sleep apnoea syndrome (sleep apnoea on a diagnostic sleep study and moderate to severe excessive daytime sleepiness*)'

Take the risks seriously - get your insurances sorted now, while you still can and use a specialist risk insurance advisor from Sapience Financial to help you get on with life - and sleep better.

Drew Browne is a specialty Financial Risk Advisor working with Small Business Owners & their Families, Dual Income Professional Couples, and diverse families. He's an award-winning writer, speaker, financial adviser and business strategy mentor. His business Sapience Financial Group is committed to using business solutions for good in the community. In 2015 he was certified as a B Corp., and in 2017 was recognised in the inaugural Australian National Businesses of Tomorrow Awards. Today he advises Small Business Owners and their families, on how to protect themselves, from their businesses.  He writes for successful Small Business Owners and Industry publications. You can read his Modern Small Business Leadership Blog here. You can connect with him on LinkedIn.  Any information provided is general advice only and we have not considered your personal circumstances. Before making any decision on the basis of this advice you should consider if the advice is appropriate for you based on your particular circumstance.