Modelling of lung cancer survival data for critical illness insurances

Abstract: We derive a general multiple state model for critical illness insurances. In contrast to the classical model, we take into account that the probability of death for a dread disease sufferer may depend on the duration of the disease, and the payment of benefits associated with a severe disease depends not only on the diagnosis but also on the disease stage. We apply the introduced model to the analysis of a critical illness insurance against the risk of lung cancer. Based on the real data for the Lower Silesian Voivodship in Poland, we estimate the transition matrix, related to the discrete-time Markov model. The obtained probabilistic structure of the model can be directly used to cost not only critical illness insurances and life insurances with accelerated death benefits option, but also to viatical settlement contracts.