The Louisiana Department of Insurance and senior counselors are helping beneficiaries for next year.
With the 2013 open enrollment period growing closer to completion for Medicare health insurance beneficiaries, officials in the industry are now ready to help people to ensure that they make the right choices for their coverage.
Assistance is now available for helping to make decisions and use the coverage more effectively.
Louisiana Department of Insurance Senior Health Insurance Information Program (SHIP) has counselors who are working throughout the state to help beneficiaries of Medicare to choose the health and prescription drug coverage that is right for them. However, those SHIP counselors are also helping seniors to make claims on their plans, to perform comparisons among supplemental and long term care insurance policies, and to work their way through the appeals process for Medicare.
Medicare health insurance community sessions will be held by SHIP throughout the state over upcoming weeks.
According to the state’s health Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon, “Because the opportunity to make changes to Medicare plans only comes once a year, I urge Louisiana seniors to contact our SHIIP counselors, who will be available by phone and in-person, to make sure they are on the plan that’s best for them.”
Donelon also explained that “These plans can change, so the option you selected in 2012 may not necessarily offer the best coverage for you in 2013.” Therefore, he is urging residents of the state who will be enrolling in Medicare for 2013 to inform themselves and to take advantage of the many ways that SHIP counselors are offering their assistance in that effort.
The Medicare open enrollment period started on October 15 and will run through December 7. This is the time in which Medicare beneficiaries are permitted to change the coverage plans that they intend to have for the upcoming year. The choices that are made during this year’s open enrollment period will provide the health insurance coverage starting on January 1, 2013. There are several options available from which beneficiaries can choose, including the Medicare Advantage plan, or the Original Medicare plan, which can be combined with the prescription drug plan (Part D) and Medigap supplemental policies.
