Medicare is a type of health insurance for those who are 65 and older, those who are under 65 with certain disabilities, and anyone with End-Stage Renal Disease, a permanent kidney failure which requires dialysis or a kidney transplant. The basics of Medicare include the four different sections of Medicare along with the basic facts of Medicare.
There are a few different sections of Medicare these sections cover things like hospital insurance, medical insurance, and more. Here are the four different sections of Medicare and what services they cover.
Medicare Part A (Hospital Insurance) helps cover:
- Inpatient care in hospitals.
- Hospice, skilled nursing facility, and home health care.
Medicare Part B (Medical Insurance) helps cover:
- Home health care, doctors’ services, and hospital outpatient care.
- Some preventive services, this helps maintain health and keep illnesses from getting even worse.
Medicare Part C helps cover:
- Insurers. Insurers receive about $800 per month for every Medicare enrollee.
Medicare Part D (Medicare Prescription Drug Coverage) helps cover:
- A prescription drug option.
- The cost of prescription drugs.
- The lowering of prescription drug costs.
Medicare has coverage policies and in order to avoid dealing with a post payment review it may be a good idea to look at a Medicare prepayment and post payment claim review booklet. Medicare has many different aspects to it, but here are some basic answers to questions and facts:
- Patients cannot pay cash for Medicare. The law prohibits private contracting between doctors and elderly patients. This means that recipients of Medicare cannot pay cash and have a private contract with their doctor.
- Automatic enrollment. When a person comes of age they are automatically enrolled into Medicare Part B. Refusal to enroll into Medicare part B leads to the patient paying a premium which is t0 percent higher each year he or she is not enrolled.
- The number of people depending on Medicare is increasing. In 2003, there were only 40 million Medicare recipients. Then, in 2010 there were 47.5 million recipients. The number of people who need Medicare is increasing.
- Health insurance and Medicare are not the same things. Medicare has no cap on expenses that are out-of-pocket expenses and it also does not pay for hospitalization that is longer than 150 days.
- Long-term and home care not covered by Medicare. Unless the long-term or home care is related to a hospitalization or other urgent care, Medicare does not cover the cost.
Madison Hewerdine is an author who writes about post payment reviews and has a passion for playing volleyball.
