Confusion lingers over Medicare changes

Senior citizens, family members gather for seminar on new plan

MOSES LAKE — Three months after President Bush's Medicare Prescription Drug Improvement and Modernization Act took effect Jan. 1, many continue to be frustrated and confused about their health insurance coverage.

"I just think it's very confusing for the elderly," said Dona Kelly. "The problem is it's changing all the time."

Kelly was one of nine people who attended a seminar Thursday at the Moses Lake Senior Living Community intended to inform people about the prescription drug changes.

Kelly is over the age of 65 and many senior citizens her age and older often find themselves lost in paperwork and keeping up on enrollment dates and deadlines for the new prescription drug plan.

That is why Randy Castro with Asuris Northwest Health teamed up with agent Cheryl Lampe of Cheryl Lampe Insurance in Moses Lake to hold an afternoon seminar to help seniors sift through all of the information.

"This is the biggest change in Medicare since it's been around," Castro told those gathered. "We're trying to take the fear out of researching this."

The new Medicare prescription drug plan was signed by Bush in 2003 as part of a process to reform Medicare by subsidizing the cost of prescription drugs. Previously, Medicare did not provide for any prescription drug coverage, raising concern that many senior citizens and the disabled were not able to access the medicines they needed.

Medicare is a federal health insurance program that began in 1965 to serve those 65 or older, people entitled to Social Security disability payments for two years or more and people with end-stage renal disease or kidney failure, regardless of income.

"There are a lot of seniors saying, 'do I pay for food or prescriptions?'" Castro said.

Anyone with Medicare can enroll in the voluntary drug coverage regardless of income, health or how they pay for prescription drugs.

As of March 14 the White House reported that in the first 10 weeks since the Medicare prescription drug benefit plan went into effect, more than 26 million people with Medicare now have prescription drug coverage, with several thousand continuing to enroll each week.

The current enrollment window closes May 15, after which there is a 1 percent penalty for each month a person waits to join.

Those who want the coverage and do not sign up by that date will not be able to do so again until November 15.

"We are getting down to the wire here," Lampe said.