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Family Life Insurance
How will your dependants cope financially without you? Life Insurance can help by providing a short term and longer income to help meet the essential bills.
Mortgage Life Insurance
Taking out a mortgage is probably the largest financial commitment many people will ever make. But what happens if a borrower dies, or becomes critically ill?
Critical Illness Cover
Most people know of someone that has suffered from cancer or had another critical illness. But what about the financial impact of this change of lifestyle?
Income Protection
Statistically customers are many times more likely to have a period of illness that lasts more than 6 months during their working lifetime, than they are to die.
Unemployment Cover Unemployment is a possibility in most walks of life and whilst many will be able to find new employment easily Unemployment Insurance can provide piece of mind.
Do You Need Help?
We would recommend you use our advice process. This will ensure that you review all the options before deciding what fits your budget and needs.
We would recommend you use our advice process. This will ensure that you review all the options before deciding what fits your budget and needs.
Life Insurance News
'Young women who exercise reduce breast cancer risk'
14 May 2008 13:08:08
Girls and young women who exercise regularly "substantially" lower their risk of developing breast cancer, scientists have claimed.
According to researchers at Washington and Harvard Universities, women who are physically active between the ages of 12 and 35 have a 23 per cent lower risk of developing premenopausal breast cancer - a finding which may affect life insurance policies.
Published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the study included almost 65,000 women and found incidence rates for invasive breast cancer dropped from 194 cases per 100,000 years of life in the least active women to 136 cases in the most active.
The levels of physical activity reported by the most active women were the equivalent of running for 3.25 hours or walking for 13 hours each week.
"We don't have a lot of prevention strategies for pre-menopausal breast cancer, but our findings clearly show that physical activity during adolescence and young adulthood can pay off in the long run by reducing a woman's risk of early breast cancer," said lead researcher Graham Colditz.
One quarter of all breast cancers are diagnosed in women before the menopause, he added.
According to Cancer Research UK, more than 44,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer each year.
Expert calls for dementia care debate
14 May 2008 13:06:21
A medical expert has called for a debate on the ethical dilemmas involved in caring for people with dementia.
Hugh Whittall, director of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, explained that carers often face difficult decisions when looking after patients with dementia - an illness which may affect their life insurance premiums.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, as the council prepares to launch a public consultation on the issue, he said: "There are tricky problems that are faced every day by those people who not only suffer dementia but care for and look after people with dementia."
The expert added that problems include the issue of truth telling and he questioned whether a woman who repeatedly forgets that her husband has died and asks after him should be told on a daily basis that he has died.
He asked: "So whilst we value truth telling, should we protect the person from that grief?"
By speaking to people who work with carers, representatives of the Alzheimer's Society and health professionals, the council has found that they feel ill-equipped to deal with the key issues surrounding dementia patients, Mr Wittall added.
According to the Alzheimer's Society there are 700,000 dementia sufferers in the UK.
The Nuffield Council on Bioethics expects to produce its final guidance in 2009.
'New pacemaker powered by energy within the body'
13 May 2008 16:48:38
The life insurance premiums for heart patients with pacemakers may be affected by the development of a new 'energy harvesting' device.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Frontiers programme, Dr Paul Mitcheson, a lecturer from the Control and Power Research Group at Imperial College London, described how the new pacemaker is powered by taking tiny amounts of energy from the body.
"If you use the energy that's available within the body, it's almost an inexhaustible source," he said.
"It's a very… residual amount of energy that you require in the background all the time which, of course, would drain a battery but, with the activity of a human being walking around, then… you've got this steady supply of energy," the expert added.
The addition of an electrical storage element in the device would overcome the problem of power loss if the heart were to stop, Dr Mitcheson continued.
He explained that one big advantage to the new pacemaker is that invasive procedures to change batteries could be avoided.
According to the British Heart Foundation, pacemakers are most commonly needed for patients whose heart rate has become too slow.
Positioned just under the collarbone, the devices have leads which are embedded into the heart.
14 May 2008 13:08:08
Girls and young women who exercise regularly "substantially" lower their risk of developing breast cancer, scientists have claimed.
According to researchers at Washington and Harvard Universities, women who are physically active between the ages of 12 and 35 have a 23 per cent lower risk of developing premenopausal breast cancer - a finding which may affect life insurance policies.
Published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the study included almost 65,000 women and found incidence rates for invasive breast cancer dropped from 194 cases per 100,000 years of life in the least active women to 136 cases in the most active.
The levels of physical activity reported by the most active women were the equivalent of running for 3.25 hours or walking for 13 hours each week.
"We don't have a lot of prevention strategies for pre-menopausal breast cancer, but our findings clearly show that physical activity during adolescence and young adulthood can pay off in the long run by reducing a woman's risk of early breast cancer," said lead researcher Graham Colditz.
One quarter of all breast cancers are diagnosed in women before the menopause, he added.
According to Cancer Research UK, more than 44,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer each year.
14 May 2008 13:06:21
A medical expert has called for a debate on the ethical dilemmas involved in caring for people with dementia.
Hugh Whittall, director of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, explained that carers often face difficult decisions when looking after patients with dementia - an illness which may affect their life insurance premiums.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, as the council prepares to launch a public consultation on the issue, he said: "There are tricky problems that are faced every day by those people who not only suffer dementia but care for and look after people with dementia."
The expert added that problems include the issue of truth telling and he questioned whether a woman who repeatedly forgets that her husband has died and asks after him should be told on a daily basis that he has died.
He asked: "So whilst we value truth telling, should we protect the person from that grief?"
By speaking to people who work with carers, representatives of the Alzheimer's Society and health professionals, the council has found that they feel ill-equipped to deal with the key issues surrounding dementia patients, Mr Wittall added.
According to the Alzheimer's Society there are 700,000 dementia sufferers in the UK.
The Nuffield Council on Bioethics expects to produce its final guidance in 2009.
13 May 2008 16:48:38
The life insurance premiums for heart patients with pacemakers may be affected by the development of a new 'energy harvesting' device.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Frontiers programme, Dr Paul Mitcheson, a lecturer from the Control and Power Research Group at Imperial College London, described how the new pacemaker is powered by taking tiny amounts of energy from the body.
"If you use the energy that's available within the body, it's almost an inexhaustible source," he said.
"It's a very… residual amount of energy that you require in the background all the time which, of course, would drain a battery but, with the activity of a human being walking around, then… you've got this steady supply of energy," the expert added.
The addition of an electrical storage element in the device would overcome the problem of power loss if the heart were to stop, Dr Mitcheson continued.
He explained that one big advantage to the new pacemaker is that invasive procedures to change batteries could be avoided.
According to the British Heart Foundation, pacemakers are most commonly needed for patients whose heart rate has become too slow.
Positioned just under the collarbone, the devices have leads which are embedded into the heart.