Important information for all individuals on Medicare or who have parents or other loved ones on Medicare.

The message below came from The National Council on the Aging (NCOA) and is worth taking the time to read. Leading national non-profit organizations have come together to create the Access to Benefits Coalition (ABC) which has developed a fast, free and confidential on-line service available to the public. By using this new on-line tool called BenefitsCheckUpRx, anyone can help Medicare beneficiaries to learn about and connect to the best combination of more than 340 different government and private programs.

Quoted from the ABC website: “The Access to Benefits Coalition™ (ABC) is dedicated to ensuring that Medicare beneficiaries with lower incomes know about and can make the best use of all available resources for reducing the costs of prescription drugs, including the new Medicare approved drug discount program and Medicare Part D (starting in 2006). Coalition members share an interest in helping close to 7 million Medicare beneficiaries (including both those aged 65 and over as well as younger persons with disabilities who qualify) find the public and private prescription savings programs they need to maintain their health and improve the quality of their lives.”

The Access to Benefits Coalition™ has developed a powerful Web-based decision support tool to help beneficiaries, as well as family caregivers and organizations who wish to help them in not only understanding, applying and enrolling in the best Medicare-approved drug discount card, but also in finding what other public and private prescription savings programs will lower their prescription costs even more.

This service is available at the following web sites: www.accesstobenefits.org. and www.benefitscheckup.org.

Note: If you visit www.accesstobenefits.org. On the left side of the page, use the drop down menu to find out if there is a local Access to Benefits coalition near you. For those who don't have direct Internet access, these local non-profits can often help people use the online service.

The BenefitsCheckUpRx provides the most benefits for people with modest incomes: if a person with Medicare has an annual income less than $19,000 for an individual or $25,000 for a couple, it is very likely that they will find a lot of help through the BenefitsCheckUpRx.

According to the NCOA message: Here is an example of the BenefitsCheckUpRx in action: A volunteer recently went on-line to help a Tulsa Oklahoma woman to dramatically reduce her medication costs. Her income is $918 a month, but the five prescriptions she takes were costing her $533 per month, or nearly $6,400 per year. It took about fifteen minutes to use the BenefitsCheckUp Service. After following up on the recommendations and enrolling in the programs identified by this we site, she will now pay $25 a month for her medicines – a savings of over $6,000 per year.

From:
Christine A. Price, Ph.D., CFLE
Assistant Professor
Extension State Gerontology Specialist
Department of Human Development & Family Science