Oral Swab Testing Tells Life Insurance Companies How Healthy You Are

To find out if you're as healthy as you say you are on your life insurance application, don't be surprised if underwriters go straight to the source: your mouth.

Instead of blood and urine tests, insurance companies sometimes require saliva samples. The test is simple. A swab is rubbed on the inside of your cheek, and the sample is sent to a lab.

"It doesn't hurt at all, and it literally takes five seconds," says Dr. Jim Palmier, medical director of ExamOne, a Quest Diagnostics company.

The procedure may be short and sweet, but that little sample of saliva can tell a lot about you.

Do you smoke? Do you do drugs? Have you been infected with HIV or hepatitis B or C?

The answers will impact your life insurance quotes.

Not the gold standard

Not all life insurance companies use swab tests, and those that do don't necessarily use them for every applicant. Palmier says insurers tend to rely on saliva samples for younger life insurance applicants and people who purchase policies with lower face amounts. Insurers do not use the swab test for genetic testing.

"Urine and blood would be considered the gold standard in testing," Palmier says.

Saliva samples are a less-expensive alternative insurers use when they don't think fuller screening is necessary.

New York Life Insurance Co., for example, uses swab tests on all applicants 18 and older for policy face amounts from $50,000 to $99,000, says Stephen Bloom, New York Life's first vice president and chief underwriter. Blood tests are used for people 18 and older who apply for policy face amounts of $100,000 and over.

Life insurance swab tests have been in use for more than two decades. In the early years, life insurance companies operated their own laboratory facilities in their home offices. Later, they began contracting with labs, such as ExamOne and Examination Management Services Inc. (EMSI)

Use of swab tests first began to increase 20 years ago, along with the use of urine and blood samples. The use of such tests has leveled off in recent years, says Kim Anderson, senior vice president of the Insurance Services Division at EMSI.

Swab tests have a couple of advantages over blood and urine tests for insurers.

"They're less invasive and less costly, not only from the collection standpoint but from testing the samples," Anderson says.

Unlike a blood test, giving a swab test doesn't require a licensed medical professional. The test is so easy, in fact, that life insurance agents themselves collect the swab samples from clients in some instances, Anderson says. In others, medical professionals conducting exams administer the swab tests.

What life insurance companies want to know

Life insurance companies vary in the types of tests they run on saliva samples. Palmier says insurers most commonly want to know whether the applicant is a cocaine user or tobacco user, or is HIV-positive. Insurers are especially interested in cocaine use because of the risky behaviors that accompany abuse of that drug, he says, but the samples can also be tested for use of other drugs. Palmier says ExamOne is in the research and development phase of a swab test for methamphetamine.

The amount of time drugs such as nicotine and cocaine stay in the system and are detectable in a swab test depends on a variety of factors, including your body fat percentage, how often you use the drug and your level of hydration.

To find out whether you're a smoker, the lab tests the sample for cotinine, a chemical the body makes from nicotine. If you're not a regular smoker, and you just happen to take a few puffs on a friend's cigarette at a party, the level of cotinine probably won't be detectable after a couple of days, Palmier says.

But if you're a regular smoker, it will take longer for the level to drop. The length of time could vary from several days to two months in rare cases, Anderson says.

To ensure an accurate test, Palmier recommends not eating anything right before the test. If you do happen to eat or drink something, rinse your mouth out with water.

"If you're truly a smoker it'll come up positive," Palmier says. It's best to be honest about your lifestyle when making a life insurance application. Lab tests likely will catch you in a lie.

The original article can be found at Insure.com:Open wide: Oral swab testing tells life insurance companies how healthy you are