Death in the Family

Event	TRICARE Qualifying Life Event?
Death in the Family	Yes. You have 90 days after a death in the family to change your TRICARE health plan.

Sponsor Dies

If your sponsor dies while serving on active duty, TRICARE continues to provide coverage for surviving family members. Plans and costs depend on:

• The sponsor's military status when they died
• If you're a spouse or a child

Spouses can keep TRICARE unless they remarry. If a spouse decides to remarry, their TRICARE coverage will end unless they marry another active duty or retired service member. TRICARE coverage for their children continues up to the normal age limits. Review the scenarios in the chart below for more information:

If your sponsor was ...	Then ...
On active duty	Children remain covered as active duty family members until they age out or lose TRICARE for other reasons. Learn more.
Retired	Your coverage won't change. Learn more.
A National Guard or Reserve member	Your benefits are determined by your sponsor's status when they died. Learn more.

Other Family Member Dies

If a family member who isn't the sponsor dies, contact your local Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System(DEERS) A database of information on uniformed services members (sponsors), U.S.-sponsored foreign military, DoD and uniformed services civilians, other personnel as directed by the DoD, and their family members. You need to register in DEERS to get TRICARE. office to find out the necessary steps to report their death. Depending on your situation, your health plan options may also change from family to individual.

Are you an adult child who may qualify for TRICARE Young Adult?

You may be able to purchase TYA when you turn 21 (or 23 if a full-time student) if:

• You aren't married.
• You don't have your own employer-sponsored health insurance.
• Your sponsor had TRICARE (as described above) when they died.

• Death Notification

  You only have to report the death to the pharmacy contractor, Express Scripts. For medical and dental care, the Defense Manpower Data Center gets information from the Social Security Administration or the uniformed services. 

  It may take some time for DMDC to get the information. If you prefer, you may notify DMDC of the death by:

  • Visiting a local Uniformed Services ID card office with a copy of the death certificate
  • Faxing a copy of the death certificate to 800-336-4416 (primary) or 502-335-9980 (alternate)
  • Mailing a copy of the death certificate to:

  DMDC/DEERS Support Office
  400 Gigling Road
  Seaside, CA 93955-6771

  If you have questions, call DMDC at 800-538-9552. Visit milConnect to learn more.

  Learn more about other TRICARE QLEs

  Retiring	Separating
  Having a Baby	Getting Married
  Moving	Getting Divorced
  Becoming Medicare Eligible	Going to College
  Child Becomes an Adult	Losing or Gaining Other Health Insurance
  Moving When Deploying	Injured on Active Duty
  Activating	Deactivating