Does Dog Insurance for Pre-Existing Conditions Exist: Yay or Nay?

Is there such a thing as dog insurance for pre-existing conditions? At this time, pre-existing medical cover isn’t available in Australia.

Generally speaking, health insurance is only designed to provide financial protection against incidents that occur after your plan starts and your waiting periods are complete. This applies whether it’s insurance for pets, or insurance for people.

Another way to put it is that pet insurance isn’t backdated. It can’t protect your pets from things that happened before you got it.

Questions about pre-existing conditions

That still leaves many questions. Like for example, what is a pre-existing condition? And if there isn’t dog insurance for pre-existing conditions what can you do about them? Can you still get pet insurance even if your pet’s past is mishap heavy? How can ensure your pawsome pet is properly safeguarded?

Let’s look at the answers, right here.

What are pre-existing conditions in dog insurance?

Like with human health insurance, your dog insurance won’t cover pre-existing conditions. That makes sense, sort of. Thing is, what exactly are pre-existing conditions anyways?

Pre-existing conditions are, as the name implies, conditions that start before your policy or during the waiting period. This is the case if the condition is diagnosed by a vet. This also applies to conditions that you or your vet notice, whether they’re diagnosed or not.

For example, let’s say your German Shepherd stops playing, walking or running as usual. You notice this, but don’t give it much thought. If these symptoms showed up before you get your plan, or during waiting periods and you then discover Rover has hip dysplasia in dogs, it won’t be covered.

You may not have known your dog has this condition. And it may not have been formally identified by a vet. But in truth it was already underway before you got your dog insurance. Read about several common dog health problems to give you a better idea of issues to safeguard against.

Insurance can cover most eventualities, but it’s important to get it at the right time. Like when your dog is still a puppy – before issues become ‘pre-existing’.

More on that further on.

Pre-existing conditions in dogs

Other than congenital conditions, which is when an abnormality is present at birth, there’s no hard and fast example of a condition that’s always a pre-existing condition. Read more about congenital and inherited disorders here.

For example, many insurers list health issues like epilepsy (read about Beagle epilepsy) and diabetes as pre-existing. However, if these only show their first signs after your pet plan’s waiting periods are completed then treatment for these conditions will usually be covered by PD Insurance.

Waiting periods differ from one condition to another, so read our pet insurance product disclosure statement to get a general sense of waiting periods.

Dog allergies

Allergies are another example of a health issue we cover (in fact, they’re our second most common claim), unless they started before your plan and were therefore pre-existing. For example, your dog has life-long dairy allergies and ends up drinking your cat’s milk with adverse reactions that need vet treatment. Unfortunately the vet bills won’t be covered in your plan.

BTW, while cats aren’t technically allergic to milk, they are lactose intolerant.

On the other hand, let’s say pup gets stung by a bee and has an allergic reaction and goes to see the vet. Treatment will be covered. That is, provided he hasn’t had this same experience before with a bee prior to getting insurance with us.

Regardless, we hope your pooch never gets a bee sting and that he continues to smell (and possibly poop on) the roses each day.

What can I do if dog insurance won’t cover pre-existing conditions?

If your pet has an existing condition, it doesn’t mean they can’t still get a pet plan. They can still get a great deal of protection from an accident plan. In fact they can even take a step up and get covered for illness related health costs too, provided the illness isn’t related to a pre-existing condition.

If your dog already has a condition when you get their plan, it simply means there will be some exclusions. And that these will be specific to the pre-existing condition.

If you think about it, if humans have pre-existing conditions, we still want health insurance. Even if our plan won’t cover our lifelong asthma or diabetes it still helps. Like for example if we’re in a car accident, or we fall pregnant or get tonsillitis.

Speaking of diabetes, it’s a big concern for Australian pet parents… Find out about diabetes in dogs and cats and read our national pet obesity day article for more top facts.

The best plan is to get dog insurance when they’re a puppy

OK, so dog insurance won’t cover pre-existing conditions. Fair enough, but what can we as do as loving pet owners to properly protect our pets? As mentioned, you can still get comprehensive cover to protect your fursome friend for accidents, other illnesses, third party liability and maybe even dental.

The best plan of all however, is getting dog insurance when your pet is young and healthy. Way before they have the chance of developing pre-existing conditions. That way, most eventualities will be covered when they do arise. The question worth asking is not if you should get pet insurance, but when.

The answer is the sooner the better. Plus, we give parents of pets aged up to one year old even more of a bonus free insurance cover period than we do everyone else who signs up online.