Wyoming Miners Insurance: Eligibility, Coverage, and Benefit Programs

Wyoming miners insurance is not a conventional insurance policy but a state-funded benefits program run by the Wyoming Miner’s Hospital Board. It pays medical, prescription, and hearing aid costs tied to four occupational conditions — cardiac, respiratory, hearing, and musculoskeletal — for current and former miners who meet the state’s service requirements. The board is a payer of last resort, so it fills gaps left by other coverage rather than replacing it.¹

Who Qualifies

You must be a current Wyoming resident and meet one of two work tests: ten total years of service at a mine site in Wyoming or a contiguous state, or a mine-related injury that keeps you from continuing to work as a miner.² The ten-year rule took effect July 1, 2018. Miners registered before that date remain under the old twelve-consecutive-months standard.³

Mining is defined broadly. Coal, trona, bentonite, uranium, sand and gravel, gypsum, and other stone mining all count.² If you have a health savings account, you have to exhaust it before the board will pay.³

What’s Covered

Benefits are limited to the four categories the program was built around in 2001: cardiac, respiratory, hearing, and musculoskeletal conditions. A medical cost outside those categories is not reimbursable, no matter how serious. Because the board pays last, it reduces its payments by whatever other public or private coverage you carry.¹

The Benefit Programs

Medical Assistance

The medical assistance program pays up to $5,000 per calendar year toward unpaid medical costs and prescription drugs for the four qualifying conditions. Since January 2024, the benefit is split: you receive the first $3,000, then must satisfy a $2,000 deductible before the remaining $2,000 becomes available.⁴

Hearing Aids

The hearing aid program pays up to $3,000 for a new set every five years. It also covers repairs at up to $250 per aid, capped at two repairs over the life of each device. Over-the-counter hearing aids are not covered.⁵ Expect out-of-pocket costs above the cap. Executive Director Angie Okray has said surveys between 2021 and 2025 found hearing aid prices from most providers ran $4,000 to $5,000, with some over $7,000.⁶

Mobile Wellness Testing

Free diagnostic screenings are available through mobile vans operated under contract with MOST Healthcare Systems and Campbell County Memorial Hospital. The vans provide blood chemistry panels, EKGs, pulmonary function tests, vision exams, and chest X-rays, and screen roughly 4,000 miners a year. Stops include Gillette, Rock Springs, Green River, Casper, Sheridan, Riverton, and Douglas, among others.⁷

Hardship Pharmacy Program

A smaller hardship program, running since August 2011, helps miners who have high prescription costs, very limited income, and no prescription insurance. Enrollees get a pharmacy card that lets their pharmacy bill the board’s claims administrator directly, so there’s nothing to pay up front and no reimbursement paperwork. The benefit must be renewed each year, and enrollment is small — eight miners as of mid-2026.⁴

How To Register and File Claims

First-time applicants submit an application form, available on the board’s website or at either office, together with documentation of mining employment. A separate version of the form is used if you worked for multiple mining employers. Once approved, you receive a Miner ID card. Keep your records current — Wyoming driver’s license, insurance information, and address — because routine audits can terminate benefits for miners whose information is out of date.⁵

Claims use separate forms for medical expenses, prescriptions, and hearing aids. Employment Benefit Management Services (EBMS), a third-party administrator, processes them. You can submit by mail, email, or in person at either board office.⁸

One step is easy to miss. Before buying hearing aids, you must call the Gillette office at 307-685-6827 or the Rock Springs office at 307-352-2925 to confirm eligibility. Buying first and seeking reimbursement later can leave you without coverage.⁵

Where the Money Comes From

The program does not draw from Wyoming’s general fund. It is financed by the Miner’s Hospital Permanent Land Fund, built from the accumulated proceeds of a 30,000-acre land grant Wyoming received at statehood in 1890, together with investment income and surface lease revenue held in a companion income account.⁹ By statute, annual appropriations to the board cannot exceed 5% of the two accounts’ combined balance, and every dollar spent requires legislative appropriation.¹⁰

As of July 2025, the Permanent Land Fund held about $89.4 million and the income account about $32.3 million.⁴ For practical purposes, that means the money to pay valid claims is there; the limits that affect you are the per-benefit caps and the four-condition rule, not the fund balance.

Who Runs the Program and Where To Find Them

The Wyoming Miner’s Hospital Board is governed by nine members. Seven represent miners statewide and are appointed by the Governor, with at least one seat each reserved for Sweetwater County and Campbell County. The other two are drawn from the hospital boards of Sweetwater and Campbell Counties and appointed by their county commissions. Day-to-day operations run out of offices in Gillette and Rock Springs under Executive Director Angie Okray.¹¹ Those two phone numbers — 307-685-6827 in Gillette and 307-352-2925 in Rock Springs — are the right starting points for a question about eligibility, a claim, or a hearing aid purchase.⁵

1
Wyoming Legislature. SF0050 – Miners’ Hospital Board Amendments
2
Wyoming Miner’s Hospital Board. Eligibility
3
Gillette News Record. Wyoming Miner’s Hospital Board Updates Eligibility
4
Wyoming Legislature. Miner’s Hospital Board Budget Presentation
5
Wyoming Miner’s Hospital Board. Forms and Resources
6
Cowboy State Daily. Hands Off Wyoming’s Exclusive Miners Fund
7
Wyoming Legislature. Program Evaluation: Wyoming Miners’ Hospital Board
8
Wyoming Miner’s Hospital Board. Contact Us
9
Wyoming Legislature. Revenue Introduction
10
Wyoming Digital Collections. Miners’ Hospital Board Budget Document
11
Wyoming Miner’s Hospital Board. Board Members and Staff