Medicare Drug Seminar Planned; Broadcast To Be Held at Cottonwood
Posted on: Wednesday, 28 September 2005, 12:00 CDT
By Journal Staff Report
A free seminar on Medicare Part D, the prescription drug coverage plan, will be held Friday, the day before private insurers begin contacting beneficiaries on behalf of their plans.
The seminar will be broadcast at Cottonwood Theatre, 10000 Coors NW, 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. It features Willard Scott of the "Today" show; Jim Miller, a senior citizen columnist and author of "The Savvy Senior: The Ultimate Guide to Health, Family and Finances for Senior Citizens"; and Tom Paul of Ovations, an insurance provider.
Sponsoring the seminar is UnitedHealth Group, a national insurance firm. Ovations is a unit of that company and provides supplemental insurance to members of AARP.
The information is intended for anyone already on Medicare's Plan A and/or Plan B -- the hospital and medical care plans -- as well as anyone eligible for Medicare or those who help care for someone on Medicare.
Plan D coverage begins Jan. 1. The enrollment period is Nov. 15 through May 15.
Topics at the seminar include information about who qualifies, enrollment and coverage dates, costs, key facts about drug formularies -- the lists of approved drugs insurers use -- and how to choose a plan.
The drug coverage is optional and is offered by Medicareapproved private companies. Starting in October, companies offering drug plans in the area will begin mailing or phoning people to encourage them to enroll in their plans.
The premiums for the standard coverage that plans may offer will cost an average of $32 to $37 a month. About $1,600 of the cost of the premium is paid by the government.
For the first $2,250 in prescription drugs, the deductible is $250 a year; Medicare pays 75 percent on the next $2,000. Once the $2,000 cap is reached, coverage ends until out-of-pocket payments come to another $2,850 a year, not including premiums. At that point, Medicare picks up 95 percent of the costs.
Total out-of-pocket costs, according to the Center for Medicare Advocacy Inc., a private nonprofit organization, is $750 a year -- deductible and co-payment -- plus about $400 in premiums for the first $2,000 paid by the standardcoverage plan.
Once the "doughnut hole" of no coverage is reached, out-ofpocket costs will have come to about $3,600 a year.
Drug plans will differ, as will their lists of the medications they cover. They may offer enhanced coverage with more benefits than the standard mandated by the law, but they cannot increase the amounts of the deductibles or out-of-pocket expenses that are in the standard.
Starting Oct. 13, the plans can be compared online at www.medicare.gov, or call (800)-MEDICARE (800) 633-4227) for printed information.
Information is also available at www.aarp.org; unitedhealthgroup.com; and www.medicareadvocacy.org.
Source: Albuquerque Journal
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