Tuition for Special Needs Schooling: HSA Eligibility

What is tuition for special needs schooling?

Tuition for special needs and schooling is the expense of attending a special school and receiving education, coaching or lessons that help a child overcome a learning disability caused by mental or physical impairments. This would also include something like a nervous system disorder, visual blindness, hearing disabilities, or birth defects that might require remedial language training.

In each case, the tuition expenses associated with treatment that helps to overcome a learning disability are eligible for reimbursement with a consumer-directed healthcare account so long as a medical professional has made a proper recommendation. This recommendation could apply to learning disability treatment lessons with, for example, a braille teacher, a lip reading teacher, or a remedial language teacher. The doctor might also recommend the learning disabled child attend a special school where the principal reason for attendance is to overcome the learning disability.

Some special schools may also offer other forms of education; if that's the case, then the other education must be incidental to the school's primary focus of overcoming a learning disability. Other medical expenses associated with school attendance are eligible for inclusion in a reimbursement. Those expenses might be costs of tuition, meals and lodging, for example.

Learning disability treatments must be recommended, by a medical professional, for the purpose of overcoming the learning disability, rather than alleviating behavioral issues or other types of education. If they are not recommended in this fashion, then the expenses associated with the treatment aren't eligible for reimbursement.