When Health Insurance Isn't Enough

>> John Stewartson is up at dawn working for the local 602 Union in Washington DC.

>> No jelly this time?

>> But by 11:30 am he is home fixing lunch for his ailing wife Linda.

>> Thank you.

>> A cancer survivor.

>> I'm gonna have to take medicine for the rest of my life.

>> Diagnosed with a brain tumor last summer she's in remission. Now it's her family's financial health at stake.

>> There's a big one here.

>> In March their health care insurance capped out at $150,000, minimum coverage by industry standards. The cost of treating cancer and its side effects demolished their life savings.

>> I think she's inaudible every cancer treatment and hit every brain cell on the way down.

>> They still owe more than $100,000 in medical bills.

>> We've had to do a lot of balancing act.

>> Dr. Depa Supermanium assumed spelling is counseling more and more patients like Linda forced to decide which treatments are worth the cost.

>> Do inaudible that somehow by choosing a treatment that is less expensive that we are compromising the quality of the care.

>> We have to fix this.

>> Senator Chris Dodd is leading the effort to push the affordable health choices act through the senate. He supports eliminating lifetime and annual caps on all health care plans.

>> The underinsured are critical group, these are people who have insurance and many cases some 53% don't realize that they're under insured so they either have huge co-pays if a problem happens or the deductable is being so high that they might as well not have insurance.

>> The Stewardsons were only offered 1 option with their union which left them uninsured after they reached the cap.

>> I'm callin to check on.

>> John calls his union and the Medicare offices everyday asking for supplemental coverage. He's had no luck so far. Linda knows John has her covered.

>> He has to cook dinner, clean the house, get up, make me breakfast, help me bathe.

>> She wishes her health care insurance plan was just as dependable.

>> He's a good man.

>> Michelle Miller, CBS News Alexandria, Virginia.

==== Transcribed by Automatic Sync Technologies ====