Medicare Advantage Plans Vs Medigap - Which Plans Are Better?

Medigap Medicare Vs Medicare Advantage Plans - Which Provide The Best Coverage At Minimum Cost?

What is Medicare?

Medicare is a federal health insurance program. It makes health insurance plans for senior citizens, specially-abled people, or for people with End-Stage Renal Disease. The different parts of Medicare (Part A, Part B, Part C, Part D) cover different services.

Medicare Advantage Plans

Medicare advantage plans 2021 are a type of health insurance plan of Medicare offered by private companies that have a contract with Medicare to provide the benefits in part A & B of medicare. Most of the advantage plans provide prescription drug coverage too. Most of the important medical services are covered in the medicare advantage plans. The original Medicare does not pay for your medicare services. The most common types of Medicare Advantage Plans are HMO (Health Maintenance Organization) Plans, PPO (Preferred Provider Organization) Plans, PFFS (Private Fee For Service) Plans, and SNPs (Special Needs Plans). Some less important plans are HMOPOS (HMO Point of Service) and MSA (Medicare Medical Savings Account) Plan.

Medicare Supplement Plans

Medigap or the Medicare Supplement plan is a supplement plan offered by medicare that fills the gaps in our current Medicare Plans. These plans are also sold by private companies. If we compare Medicare advantage plans vs Medigap we find that the original Medicare Advantage plans cover most of our needs but not all of them. Supplement plans are helpful if we expect more from our plan. Some of the remaining costs such as copayments, deductibles, coinsurance, etc. can be insured with supplement plans. However, you must have a Medicare Advantage Plan active to apply for a supplement plan. A supplement plan can not be bought alone.

A few facts about Medigap are:

•              You must have Part A & B of Medicare already covered.

•              These plans are different from Medicare Advantage plans. Comparing Medigap Medicare vs Medicare Advantage plans, we see that advantage plans provide you the benefits of Medicare while Medigap just supplements the plan.

•              You have to pay a private insurance company the monthly premium for both Original Medicare Plans or Medigap Plans.

•              Medicare Supplement Plans covers only one person. If you want that for your spouse and yourself, you need to buy two Medigap Plans.

•              All the Medigap policies are renewable after one year.

•              One can buy a Medicare Supplement plan from any licensed insurance company in his/her district.

•              Medigap policies sold after 2006 do not cover prescription drugs at all.

•              You can’t buy a Supplement Plan if you have an Advantage Plan if you’re not planning to switch to Original Medicare again.

Medicare supplement plans were made to cover the flaws in the Original Medicare Plans.

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