Medical questions regarding PSA level and getting life insurance?
meaghan asked:
I’m a life insurance agent and have an applicant who has an elevated PSA level of 8. He has had 3 biopsies in the last 3 yrs, all indicating no cancer, yet he was declined due to the elevation. When I spoke with an underwriter at one of the insurance companies I’m affiliated with, I was told to have the applicant go on “the medication that lowers PSA levels”, get a declaration of good health from his urologist, resubmit his application in 3 months when his PSA level has returned to a normal range (around 4), and then have the applicant stop taking the medication if he so desired. When I spoke with the applicant he informed me that there is no medication that lowers PSA levels or his urologist would have recommended it to him by now because he’s had an elevated PSA for 10 yrs, yet had no cancer. My questions are…
1.) Is there a prescribed medication proven to lower PSA levels?**
2.) Is the recommendation made by the underwriter ethical or even informed?
3.) Would any urologist in his right mind submit a declaration of good health when prostrate cancer is involved considering the inconsistencies between an elevated PSA and prostate cancer. By inconsistencies I mean many men have elevated PSA’s but never get cancer and many men have PSA’s in the “normal” range and do develop it.
**Please do not take this opportunity to post your “all natural supplement” website w/100’s of quotes about how well it worked for other people. I’m looking for an actual prescription medication that doctors prescribe to lower a man’s PSA level.
Opinions on the underwriter’s recommendation are welcome.
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Tagged With Biopsies, Good Health, Psa Levels
Comments
3 Responses to “Medical questions regarding PSA level and getting life insurance?”
I’m no expert, but this underwriter sounds like a ex-Countrywide Finance mortgage loan officer. I’d look for another insurer.
I’m an agent who mostly does group and a former pharmacy techinician. I have never heard of it. But the person I would ask is your local pharmacist. They are actually much more up to date on drugs, since that is all they do.
Not sure who the underwriter is (or what company), but I would send him an email with the clients response and ask him what drug he is looking for. I think it is ethical, because he is at least giving you some options. The UW is looking at a chart that says what he has to do to approve the claim. If the chart is telling him he needs X, Y and Z, that is what he has to have.
I am an underwriter in a different country.
My understanding (and i’m not a Dr) Is that there are medications to treat a condition known as Benign Prostatic Hypertrophy (which can caused an elevated PSA reading) - wether these have the effect of reducing the PSA reading i’m not sure - you should request the underwriter discuss the case with their Chief Medical Officer/Medical Director as on the surface their decision seems very odd - If the client has benign prostatic hypertrophy normally this would not result in this sort of decision.