Open Enrollment for Medicare Advantage, or Prescription Drug Plans

You may also want to read: Your Work on Part "D" is not over yet!

Robert Fassbach, editor, www.seniorark.com

Medicare Advantage Plans are health plan options that are part of the Medicare program. If you join one of these plans, you generally get all your Medicare-covered health care through that plan. This coverage can include prescription drug coverage. Medicare Advantage Plans include:

• Medicare Health Maintenance Organization (HMOs)
• Preferred Provider Organizations (PPO)
• Private Fee-for-Service Plans
• Medicare Special Needs Plans

Some Medicare Advantage Plans include a prescription drug benefit.

When you join a Medicare Advantage Plan, you use the health insurance card that you get from the plan for your health care. In most of these plans, generally there are extra benefits and lower co-payments than in the Original Medicare Plan. However, you may have to see doctors that belong to the plan or go to certain hospitals to get services.

To join a Medicare Advantage Plan, you must have Medicare Part A and Part B. You will have to pay your monthly Medicare Part B premium to Medicare. In addition, you might have to pay a monthly premium to your Medicare Advantage Plan for the extra benefits that they offer. The government pays the lion's share of the cost of any Medicare Advantage program, something around $800 to $1,000 per month for every Senior enrollee. But one must make a choice of any plan very carefully. You may need to seek out the assistance of a state representative to help you sift through the maze.

In 2010, for the year 2011, open season for enrolling in Medicare Advantage, or Part D prescription plans was November 15 through December 31. Medicare Advantage open enrollment allows people on Medicare to make a single plan election into or out of a Medicare Advantage Plan. Beneficiaries should carefully evaluate their plan options, not be pressured into making a quick decision and be on the look out for misleading sales pitches and promises that seem too good to be true.