Between labor and delivery, health insurance and child care, the cost to have a baby in Arizona is over $27,892, according to an analysis by QuoteWizard.
Main results for Arizona
Labor and delivery: $12,892
Child care: $9,748
Health insurance: $5,252
READ ALSO: Here are Arizona’s top 10 ranking lists for 2022
Health insurance, childcare, unexpected medical expenses: the cost of having a child can go far beyond labor and delivery. We found that having a child costs between $21,000 and $37,000 in the first year, depending on where you live.
Alaska, Massachusetts and New York are the most expensive states to have a baby, while Arkansas, Alabama and Mississippi are the cheapest states to have a child. Alaska has the highest childbirth costs, West Virginia has the most expensive health insurance, and Massachusetts has the highest child care cost.
Below are the national average costs for childbirth, childcare and health insurance:
Childbirth: $11,687
Child care: $10,075
Health insurance: $5,227
Additional prenatal medical visits
Of course, expect to see your doctor or obstetrician a good number of times between the time you become pregnant and the time you give birth.
What is not always expected: visiting him more than a dozen times during your pregnancy.
If you need to see your doctor more often than usual before you give birth, you will pay for it, literally and figuratively.
Specifically, you’ll need to take care of the co-pay that your health plan (if you’re insured) charges you for these visits. Usually this amount is between $15 and $35, but check your policy or contact your insurer if you want to be sure.
If you don’t have health insurance, expect to pay at least $100 to $200 for each trip.
Unexpected diagnostic tests
The majority of prenatal blood tests and screenings your doctor will order in the nine months before you give birth will come as no surprises. (For more information on the most common, read our article: “Expected Pregnancy Costs and How Health Insurance Covers Them and Sometimes Doesn’t Cover Them.”)
Some of them may seem to come out of nowhere, especially if any issues or problems arise while you are pregnant. Here are some examples:
Choriocentesis
Doctors and obstetricians usually order this test in the first trimester and reserve it for high-risk pregnancies. It uses a sample of cells taken from a woman’s placenta to check for birth defects, genetic conditions, and other potential complications and problems.
Unfortunately for expectant mothers, this is as important as it is expensive. Without health insurance, you may have to pay up to $5,000 for it. The low-end cost estimate: about $1,400.
Even with insurance, however, you’ll likely have to contribute to cover some of its costs. The amount you need to contribute depends on your plan and whether or not you meet your annual deductible. After that, you shouldn’t have to pay more than around $100, but don’t take that as gospel. Check with your insurer or healthcare provider if you want to be sure before adding chorionic villus sampling (also called CVS) to your schedule.
NIPS testing
This test is often done in the first trimester as well. And it also checks for certain birth defects or genetic disorders.
Like CVS, NIPS tests (NIPS is short for Non-Invasive Prenatal Screening, by the way) are generally not cheap. In fact, experienced moms on the whattoexpect.com forums say it can cost up to $2,000 if your health plan doesn’t cover it.
Others have reported being charged as little as $200 for a NIPS test, so you’ll definitely want to check with a number of clinics and labs if your doctor or obstetrician recommends you get one at some point. given.
Also contact your insurer if you have health coverage. Some plans do a better job of paying for the cost of a NIPS test than others. The last thing you want to do is have one made and then find that yours only covers a small portion of the resulting bill.
Along the same lines: Most health insurance plans only cover these tests if a doctor considers a woman’s pregnancy to be “high risk.”
Amniocentesis
Again, not all women undergo amniocentesis when preparing to have a baby. Indeed, as was the case with the CVS and the NIPS test, healthcare providers generally limit this screening to high-risk pregnancies.
Therefore, don’t expect your health insurance plan to pay for amniocentesis if your doctor doesn’t consider it medically necessary. And even if that’s the case, you’ll probably have to pay a co-payment or coinsurance fee.
If you are uninsured, be careful. Amniocentesis, which tests a woman’s amniotic fluid for genetic conditions like Down syndrome, costs between $1,000 and $7,000 or more.
Additional ultrasounds
Most mothers-to-be undergo at least one ultrasound in the nine months between when they became pregnant — or when they first became aware of their pregnancy — and their due date. Many suffer more than that.
Although the majority of US health plans cover an ultrasound performed between 16 and 20 weeks (it checks your baby’s position and otherwise examines their health), many of them stop there. Unless, of course, a physician or obstetrician deems them necessary for the health or well-being of the mother or child.
In other words, if you just want to check in on your baby’s growth every few weeks or so, don’t be shocked if you have to pay out of pocket.
Ultrasounds aren’t horribly expensive, thankfully, but they’ll still cost you $200 or more without the support of your health plan. This amount can vary greatly depending on where the procedure is performed, so feel free to shop around if you have to pay for ultrasounds out of your own pocket.
All kinds of complications
There is no shortage of complications that can trigger pregnancy. A handful of examples:
- anemia
- dangerous positioning of the umbilical cord
- irregular blood pressure
- jaundice
- neurological problems
- premature rupture of the amniotic sac
- amniotic fluid emboli
Some of these complications are more common than others. And some of them are more expensive than others.
All of them have the ability to increase your pregnancy costs, especially your childbirth costs. For example, parents.com reports that “a birthing stay costs an average of 55% more ($5,900) for a woman with diabetes.”
Health insurance should cover most of these costs, but don’t assume it. Review your policy or contact your insurer to get an overview of your particular situation.
Premature birth
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (aka the CDC), one in 10 babies is born prematurely in the United States
Despite this, they are still generally unexpected. It’s a problem for pregnant women and their partners for all sorts of reasons, one of which is that a March of Dimes study found healthcare for these newborns costs almost 11 times as much. only for those without such complications.
With so many different aspects of a pregnancy, preterm or preterm birth, it’s hard to say how much health insurance will or will not cover its costs.
If you are insured, however, your plan should cover at least some of them. To find out how much this will cover, call your insurance company. And if you’re uninsured and struggling with your healthcare costs, consider contacting your local Medicaid agency for help.
Other unexpected delivery costs
As has been stated many times before, giving birth tends to be expensive. Even if you have health insurance.
Most moms-to-be plan for this, but that doesn’t mean they plan for every cost and expense.
The thing is, a number of services and other components combine to create the huge “delivery bill” that shocks many new mothers (and their partners, if any). Some typical examples, courtesy of costhelper.com:
- the services of an obstetrician or gynecologist
- the services of an anesthesiologist and epidural (if used)
- the cost of your hospital room
- a daycare fee
- miscellaneous lab fees
- any medicine or medical equipment
Each of these expenses can skyrocket — or at least surprise — if issues or problems arise before or during your big day. Since, whenever possible, it’s important to stay on top of what’s being done and what you might be charged for.
This is especially true if you don’t currently have health insurance. Does this describe your situation? Read our article on how to choose a health insurance plan. Or check out this article: “Everything you need to know to apply for health insurance”.
Lactation consultation and breast pump
It’s unlikely that many moms-to-be will come to the point of giving birth without knowing about breast pumps. As such, it could be argued that it’s not the best candidate for an unexpected pregnancy cost to highlight in an article like this.
That said, it’s likely that a fair number of mothers-to-be are unaware that health insurance often covers breast pumps. And this often also covers lactation consultation.
You can thank the Affordable Care Act, also known as the ACA or Obamacare, for that. For this reason, most US health plans must cover a wide range of preventive health services. An example is breastfeeding advice and support, with supplies like breast pumps being one type of ‘support’. (For more general information on this topic, read our article on health insurance and preventive care.)
As you might expect, just because health plans have to cover breastfeeding counseling and support doesn’t mean they cover all of these areas equally. An example: some only pay for manual or electric breast pumps. Or they only pay for rental units. Some limit how long rental pumps can be paid for. Or they may stipulate when you can rent or buy a unit (eg before or after delivery) for your plan to cover.
Given all of the above, contact your insurer as soon as possible during your pregnancy and ask what breastfeeding services your policy covers. During this conversation, ask specific questions about lactation consultants, counseling and courses. Your health insurance may also cover some or all of their costs.
You won’t save a lot of money here if your health plan steps in to help, but you could save a few hundred dollars. On the other hand, if you don’t have insurance and have to pay out of pocket for a breast pump or a lactation consultation, at least you won’t have to pay a lot of money in this case.
