Entries for June 2008

The net amount of Social Security checks will stop increasing for as many as 20% of Social Security recipients within the next six years, says a new study by Advisor editor Mary Johnson. That's because, in relatively few years, rising Medicare Part B premiums will completely consume annual Cost-Of-Living Adjustments for growing numbers of seniors. ...

Older Americans in Medicare's Part D prescription drug program are more likely to pay at least $300 a month for medicines than those on other plans, a study published Tuesday by the journal Health Affairs has found. Experts consider the poll of more than 16,000 seniors, performed by the Kaiser Family Foundation, the Commonwealth Fund, and the T...

WASHINGTON, D.C. (AP) - Consider it the other drug problem: Millions of people don't take their medicine correctly - or quit taking it altogether - and the consequences can be deadly. On average, half of patients with chronic illnesses like heart disease or asthma skip doses or otherwise mess up their medication, says a report being issued later th...

CHICAGO (Reuters) - New prescription drug coverage in the federal Medicare insurance plan for the elderly drove a boost in use of pricey brand-name drugs such as statins and ulcer medications, an analysis released on Tuesday said. Medicare, available to 43 million elderly and disabled Americans, began to pay for prescription drugs in 2006, the ...

New York, NY -- People in private Medicare health plans can disenroll from their plans if they signed up after receiving misleading information, according to the Centers on Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). To date, neither CMS nor the insurance companies that operate Medicare private health plans have informed people enrolled in these plan...

Somerset County senior citizens who thought they were getting help with the doughnut hole provision of Medicare Part D prescription drug coverage with the new Somerset County Drug Discount Card received bad news from Tuesday's county commissioners' meeting. None of their purchases with the new NACo card made during their doughnut hole will coun...

Senior beneficiaries enrolled in a Medicare Part D prescription drug plan still lag behind the coverage afforded seniors covered by employer plans or under a veterans' health plan, according to a report in the journal Health Affairs. The report, which surveyed some 16,000 senior citizens, states that while more senior citizens have drug coverage th...

The open enrollment period for the Medicare prescription drug benefit begins on Thursday, and CMS has established a new online tool to help with the comparison of plans, the Wall Street Journal reports. The tool, which appears on the Medicare.gov Web site, allows users to enter the list of medications that Medicare beneficiaries currently take ...

Attention seniors -- and those who love them. Medicare Part D -- the prescription drug program -- is back again. From Nov. 15 through Dec. 31, there is a new "open enrollment" period for 2008 Part D coverage. So, here's a reminder of how Medicare Part D works, along with a quick lesson in how to use the Medicare.gov "PlanFinder" tool to choose ...

As if escalating prices for food and gas weren't enough of a worry, most seniors in Medicare's prescription-drug program are paying considerably higher monthly premiums for coverage this year, according to a study to be released today. Those in the 10 largest plans -- which account for nearly three-fourths of seniors signed up for drug coverage...

Chicagoan Jonathan Winans, 75, is curtailing costs in this time of high gas and food prices, in part, by zeroing in on prescription costs. The retired Dominick's deli manager has high blood sugar, high cholesterol, arthritis and a heart condition. He's on a dozen medications, and his wife, Elaine, 76, is on pain medication for arthritis. "I hav...

Biotech drugmaker Amgen Inc. is among the companies that could see profits trimmed by a Congressional spending bill aimed at streamlining the Medicare program. On Friday Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus released a $20 billion bill that outlines Medicare spending through 2010. Roughly 44 million seniors U.S. receive health coverage throu...

Medicare premiums might soon start crushing retiree spending power. I estimate that many a long-lived couple might need to reduce their retirement spending on nonmedical consumption by 13 percent to 26 percent to avoid sharp declines in purchasing power as they get older. This is not an alarmist fantasy. My estimates come from projecting historical...