Nowadays it's a commonly shared dream to live, work, travel or study abroad - and as flights get cheaper and the internet and email broadens our minds and opens up our world to a whole host of international opportunity, so more and more of us are getting to live the dream and explore the wider world.

When we move overseas many of us buy travel insurance with our flight package but our thoughts about our own personal welfare go little further than that – apart from getting a place to live and maybe finding a job too! However, when living abroad a little more thought needs to go into our overall health and wellbeing because health care services around the world differ greatly as does the cost of getting decent medical assistance.

Taking care of yourself when living abroad should be an initial priority, and the options available include having basic international insurance to cover accident and emergency treatment, getting repatriation cover if you're traveling to somewhere fairly inhospitable where medical facilities are rudimentary, or spending a fortune of an all singing all dancing international health insurance scheme that will cover you for all eventualities!

The majority of us opt for something in between all the extremes so that we don't have to worry about our health but we don't have to worry about the depletion of our bank account each month on policy payments either!

It is well worth shopping around international health insurance providers, specialist expatriate health care providers and also looking at the local offerings in the country you're moving to. For those moving to reside in one country it's enough just to get the level of cover recommended by that country. For those traveling the world then naturally enough a good insurance that will cover for all worst case scenario extremes is well worth considering! After all, no one wants to be left in the middle of nowhere with a broken leg and no means to pay for some painkillers and plaster!

Once a policy has been found that matches both your requirements and your budget and you've read the small print, familiarized yourself with the main points, restrictions, excesses and inclusions of the policy hopefully it can all be forgotten about and you will never need to make use of it. If the worst happens and you fall ill though, at least you will know that you have nothing to worry about apart from concentrating on getting better, your health insurance provider will take care of all of the rest for you.