Our senior’s health and safety is our priority. Our goal is to enable elderly in our community to live longer and healthier lives. There are different things that we do here at Right Accord in an effort to provide quality health care and ensure the well-being of our seniors here in Sarasota and Manatee Counties.
One of the things is providing information and resources to educate our seniors particularly in the maze of navigating the health care system.
Medicare Part D is your Medicare Prescription Coverage. It is a prescription drug option run by private insurance companies approved by Medicare and contracted by Medicare to help cover the cost of prescription drugs. It may help the elderly lower the drug costs and help protect seniors from higher costs in the future.
Seniors are eligible to enroll for Medicare when they turn 65 years old. You can enroll Medicare Part D within the 7 month period that begins 3 months before the month you turn age 65, includes the month you turn age 65, and ends 3 months after the month you turn age 65.
November 15 to December 31 of each year is the enrollment period and the time when you can switch your Medicare prescription drug coverage and coverage begins on the 1st of January the following year.
Seniors may also enroll between January 1 to march 31 of each year if they already have a Medicare prescription drug coverage. You must stay enrolled for that calendar year starting the date your coverage begins.
There are certain situations where you may be able to switch or drop Medicare plans such as if you move out of the service area, lose other creditable prescription drug coverage or live in an institution.
What you pay is a monthly premium in addition to your Part B, yearly deductible (some plans don’t have deductible) copayments or coninsurance or your share after the deductible.
The actual drug plan costs varies depending on your prescriptions, the plan you choose, whether the pharmacy you use is in the network and whether the prescription drugs are in your plan’s formulary list.
A coverage gap is available with most Medicare drug plans to pay after your plan spent certain amount and you have pay out-of-pocket limit for the year.
Catastrophic coverage is available once you reach your plan’s out-of pocket limit during coverage gap. This can assure you that once you have exhausted your covered drugs and out-of-pocket limit, you only pay a small copayment for the rest of the year.
You may want to check with the State Health Insurance Assistance Program to compare different plans and costs or visit www.medicare.gov for more information on your Medicare benefits.
For in-home care assistance and seniors who prefers to stay at home instead, please contact us at (941) 366-0801 for free consultation and care assessment in Sarasota, Siesta Key, Longboat Key, Bird Key, Casey Key, Venice, Osprey, Nokomis and Lakewood Ranch.
Tags: elderly, Florida, health care, Manatee County, medicare, safety, Sarasota County, seniors
