Medicare - A Good Value? What, if any, improvements would you want to make to the Medicare program ?

[GailL1]

1st question:  Do you think that the whole program of Medicare is a good value to you - meaning pretty complete for the price you pay?

As the header question said:  What, if any, improvements would you want to make to the Medicare program ?

Like adding dental, vision and hearing or anything else.

Better drug coverage?

Like having a maximum out of pocket - annual or lifetime - with added coverage after reaching this point.  What would that figure be?

Like lower Part B premiums or deductible or none at all?

Like lower Part A deductible per incident or none at all?

Would you include changes to your home to make it easier for you to live there?  Like ramps, widening doors, etc 

Would you include some activities of daily living care?  For how long?

Whatever you think the program might need to be an improvement for you.

Now, next question - How Much Would You Be Willing To Pay for The things you listed?

[papawofboo]

I thought you had started a good post, as much as people complain you would think they would have some idea on how to improve.

[GailL1]

Thing is @papawofboo, one has to actually know about the program to make suggestions for improvement and many Medicare beneficiaries know only a tiny bit, if even that, about the overall program and their concern is only what is in their own benefit rather than the programs as a whole, like lower premiums for [whatever].

[papawofboo]

We have advantage plans, so those things are included. One problem with advantage plans is that they are not taken by most doctors in small town USA. My sister-in-law lives in one of those towns and not a single doctor took an advantage plan. Another problem is the in-network, right now my wife may lose one of the hospitals because they haven't been able to extend their contract. Of course this happens even in the private sector.

Good topic, looking forward to seeing different thoughts.

[GailL1]

@papawofboo - yes, access is definitely a problem with Medicare Advantage plans - only way around that is to buy the BEST that you have access to -  However, access is also a problem for Traditional Medicare too - in rural communities across America, the old docs are retiring, leaving and then there are none to take their place.  

Yes, many rural hospital are now having a hard time keeping their doors open - 

Now what would encourage doctors to set up shop in small towns, what would help Medicare Advantage plans to keep doctors in their network and what would keep smaller rural hospitals open - Bingo - you got it - MONEY!!

Now how they get that commodity is the question.  

Goes back to my initial question -  How Much Would You Be Willing To Pay?  Seems everybody wants somebody else to pay.  

[TRL1111]

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@GailL1 wrote:

Now, next question - How Much Would You Be Willing To Pay for The things you listed?

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Ha!  I can answer that on behalf of pretty much everyone here, based on their posts:  $0.  You've seen them squawk about losing premium gyms under their gym benefit.  I asked several times, to different people, how much they'd be willing to pay for a benefit that costs UHC $31 every time they walk in the door, and got crickets.

Is Medicare good value?  I'll say!  My individual insurance premium before I was eligible for Medicare was about $1,000 a month, for a deductible of many thousands of dollars.  My boyfriend won't be eligible for Medicare for another seven years, and the premium for his individual policy is already $1,000 a month, albeit with a low $2000 deductible; we'd change to a much higher deductible since he's healthy, but his plan is grandfathered in and we don't dare make a peep...  

Because we travel fulltime and his policy provides access to the Blue Cross network all over the country.  There are POS plans available to him now, but they're also over $1,000 a month and for $1,000 he'd have a deductible of at least $5,000 but, most importantly, we don't know how they work, with POS being some sort of hybrid between HMO and PPO.  If nothing else, all my Medicare research has made me realize it's dangerous to buy insurance if you don't know how it works (assuming you have the money to allow you to make choices).

Because he has access to such a big nationwide network, his policy is almost as good as my Medicare + Plan G supplement when it comes to access to providers, but at a much higher price (my premium is $335/month, his is $1,000 a month).  Out-of-pocket expense wise, my maximum exposure is $257, and his coverage doesn't even kick in until he pays a $2,000 deductible and I don't even know what his out-of-pocket maximum exposure is.

Maybe praising Medicare by comparing it to the individual insurance market is faint praise, but it's my reality.  And, don't forget that people pay more for employer-provided health insurance than they usually realize, because it doesn't come directly out of their own pocket (the employer pays some chunk of it on their behalf, presumably taking that into account when setting the employee's pay).  It's another of the nuances when it comes to health insurance that people often don't understand.

[GailL1]

@TRL1111 

My experience with Medicare is about the same as yours - Yes, a really good value.  And my experience before Medicare was much like your boyfriend.  My husband and I were self-employed and traveled a lot so your got good coverage that could move around with you in case needed.  The BCBS plan we had was wonderful - and of course, because it was so wonderful, it is not longer available.  I was paying about $ 1600 a month (THAT’S EACH) for it when I began Medicare.  By great, I means a $ 500 deductible, $ 150 for emergency care including emergency transport, including air.  $ 150.00 medication deductible and then $ 25 per Rx - that really helped out when my husband got cancer.  

That’s why when President Obama came up with the ACA and kept saying that individual policies were crap - I had no idea what he was talking about - I knew mine wasn’t crap, but yes we did pay dearly for it - but hey, that was the cost of doing business and when you want the best, you buy the best.