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Looking for a Medicare Part D drug plan that will cost you the least in 2008 and cover all or most of your prescription drugs? This step-by-step guide provides a direct route to that information through Medicare's online Drug Plan Finder.

Use this guide if:

You are currently enrolled in a "stand-alone" Part D plan (one that provides only prescription drug coverage) and want to compare it with other options available in 2008. Plans will change their costs and benefits and offer new choices for 2008, so comparing plans is essential to making the right decision for next year.

You are helping a family member or friend who is now in a Part D plan or looking to join one.

You are considering enrolling in a Part D plan for the first time.

You currently get your prescription drugs in other ways—for example, through retiree drug coverage or buying low-cost drugs from abroad—and want to see how they compare with Medicare drug coverage.

Go to the end of this page for tips on other kinds of searches—for example, if you have limited income and qualify for Extra Help or are considering joining a Medicare Advantage plan that covers both health care and drugs in one package.

Important: Before you start, make a list of all the prescription drugs you use, plus their dosages and how often you take them. This is an essential step for finding out how much you would pay out of pocket under each plan in 2008.

1. Go to www.medicare.gov and click on Medicare Prescription Drug Plans—2008 Plan Data.

2. Click on Find & Compare Plans.

3. IGNORE "Begin Personalized Search." Click on Begin General Search.

4. Enter ZIP code. IGNORE age and health status boxes. Click on the No boxes for the next three questions on this page. Click on Continue.

5. On the next page (Review Current Coverage and Consider Options), click on Continue.

6. Click on Enter My Drugs.

7. Enter your first drug name in the box and click on Search for Drug (or click on the alphabetical drug list). If you are presented with a box listing several versions of this drug, highlight the one that you take and click on Add Selected to Your Drug List. The drug will appear in a list box. Repeat for each drug you use.

8. When all your drugs are on the list, click on the little box below the list to remove the check mark. (You can find out how to lower your drug costs at a later stage.) Click on Continue.

9. You will now see your list of drugs with dosages and quantities, which you can change to match your own. This is the MOST IMPORTANT STEP in the whole process. Plug in your exact dosage on the pull-down list alongside each drug name. Put in the exact quantities you take per month—for example, if you take two pills a day, change the default from 30 to 60; if it's one pill a week, change from 30 to 4. If you take a drug less frequently—say once every two months—use the pull-down lists to make that change. Click on Continue.

10. You can now save this drug list to avoid having to enter it all over again if you lose it or want to use it for a later search. Enter a password date that's easy to remember (such as your birthday) and then click on Continue. You will then be given an ID number to use when retrieving the list on a future occasion. Make a note of the number and click Continue. If you don't want to save the list, click on Skip This Step.

11. IGNORE the invitation to select a pharmacy and click on Continue. (Selecting a specific pharmacy is unnecessary and doing so at this stage may prevent you from finding the plans that are the least expensive for your needs.)

12. You will now see a list of five of the Medicare drug plans available in your area. (To see more or all of these plans, click on the Show links [10 per page, etc.] below the list.) The first plan shown is the least expensive overall, reflecting an estimate of your likely out-of-pocket costs for all of 2008. The plans that follow are in ascending order of expense. The columns to the right of each plan’s name provide the following information:

• Estimated annual cost: This dollar amount, showing your likely total out-of-pocket expenses for the whole year, includes the plan's fixed costs (monthly premium, annual deductible) and what you will pay for the drugs you have entered. This amount is based on average costs for 30-day supplies from local "preferred pharmacies" (those that are in your plan's network) and does not reflect mail order costs, which are often lower.
  
• Monthly premium: What you pay each month for coverage from this plan.
  
• Annual deductible: What you pay for your drugs out of pocket at the beginning of the year (or whenever you join a Medicare drug plan) before coverage kicks in. $0.00 means the plan has no deductible.
  
• Coverage in the gap: This shows whether the plan covers any drugs in the doughnut hole, the gap in coverage in the middle of the Medicare drug benefit. If your drug costs are high enough to put you in the gap, you'd then normally pay 100 percent of your costs until you reach an out-of-pocket spending limit ($4,050 in 2008.) No "stand-alone" drug plan in 2008 will give full coverage in the gap (meaning all the brand-name and generic drugs it normally covers), as some did in 2006 and 2007. But some offer coverage for "all generics" or "preferred generics" or "some generics" or (in the case of one plan in Florida) "some generics and some brands."
  
• Number of network pharmacies: Clicking on the number in this column brings up a list of pharmacies in your area and indicates whether or not they are in this plan’s network. You can alter the radius of miles to see more pharmacies a further distance away.

13. The list of plans described in step 12 gives only a general idea of costs. To compare plans properly and make an informed choice between them, you need to look at the details of each plan—or at least those of the four or five plans that head the list. To start, click on the name of the first plan at the top of the left column. You will now see a page headed "Plan Drug Details," which gives a lot of information about your drugs under the plan you have selected, including the following:

• Your fixed costs—monthly premiums and annual deductible (if any).
• Total annual out-of-pocket costs (including premium) in two amounts—one for drugs bought from preferred network pharmacies (30-day supplies) and the other for drugs ordered by mail (90-day supplies). Mail order is usually less expensive, but some plans do not offer this option.
• Plan ratings. This rates the plan for performance on certain questions—such as how good the plan's customer service is, how easy it is to get prescriptions filled, how well it handles complaints etc.—based on Medicare reviews.
• Drug coverage information. This gives a list of the drugs you have selected and the "tier" (level of charges) that applies to each drug. Tiers range from 1 (least expensive copay) to 4 or 5 (most expensive copays). (To find out the actual copay for these tiers, click on View Important Notes and Benefit Summary at the top left of the page.) The columns farther to the right show whether there are any restrictions on each drug. (For what these restrictions mean, see below, under "Things to bear in mind.") If any of your drugs are not covered under this plan, it will be shown as "NOT ON FORMULARY" in the "Tier (Formulary Status)" column.
• Monthly drug cost details at preferred pharmacies. This chart shows what each of your drugs, if purchased from a retail pharmacy in the plan's network, will cost on a monthly basis at four different levels of drug coverage:
   
  • during the period before your deductible (if any) is met
  • during the initial coverage period (before total drug costs spent by you and the plan during the year reach $2,510)
  • during the coverage gap (also known as the "doughnut hole," when you pay 100 percent for your drugs, unless this plan offers coverage in the gap or your costs are not high enough to reach it)
  • during the catastrophic coverage period (low copays which kick in after you've spent $4,050 out of pocket, not including premiums, in the year).
  The left column shows the full price of your drugs under this plan. This is what you will pay until your annual deductible is met (if your plan has one) and during the coverage gap (unless the plan covers some of your drugs in the gap). If the full price also appears in the "initial coverage period" column, it usually means the plan does not cover this drug at all. (But this can also happen if the drug's full price is less than the copay would be—in this case the plan is charging you the lesser of the two prices.) If you see a copay instead of the full price in the "Gap" column, it means the plan covers this drug in the gap.
• Monthly drug cost details at mail-order pharmacies. To see a similar chart showing the monthly cost of your drugs if purchased by mail order, click the Show button on the right side. If this plan does not offer mail order, this option will be missing from the page.
• How costs vary among retail pharmacies. You can use the "My Pharmacies" section to compare the cost of your drugs at different local pharmacies—prices will vary somewhat among "preferred" pharmacies in the plan's network. (See bullet 4 in the "Things to bear in mind" list below.) However, BE CAREFUL. When you click on Change Pharmacy Selection, the list that appears may include pharmacies that are not in this plan's network. Prices at a plan's out-of-network pharmacies are much higher—in some cases twice as high—than those at its in-network pharmacies. To identify pharmacies that are in this plan's network, click on View Pharmacy Network at the top left of the page. This brings up a list of pharmacies within a certain radius of miles. A "yes" or "no" in the right column indicates whether each pharmacy is in or out of the plan's network. To widen the radius, alter the distance shown in the box and click on Find Pharmacies. (If you click on View Pharmacy Network and nothing happens, it could be that your Web browser is blocking pop-ups. Disable your pop-up blocker to access the pharmacy list.)
• Out-of-pocket costs, month by month at a glance. The bar graph at the end of this page is a useful way to see how your expenses will change from month to month under this plan and whether you'll fall into the doughnut hole. If the plan has no deductible and your drug costs are too low to put you into the doughnut hole, the cost for each month of the year will be the same. Otherwise, you will see different monthly amounts according to coverage level. For a detailed breakdown, click on Show explanation of these costs. The graph gives costs only for drugs purchased at retail pharmacies, not for drugs purchased by mail order, which are usually less expensive.
• Whether this plan allows you to fill prescriptions anywhere in the United States. Click on View Important Notes and Benefit Summary at the top of the page. (This option is useful for people who spend part of the year away from home.)
• How this plan's costs in 2008 compare with its costs for 2007. To see last year's costs, select Click here to display 2007 plan data at the top of the "Plan Drug Details" page.

14. Once you've viewed one plan's details, click on your browser's Back button to return to the main list of plans and repeat the process above for each plan you want to consider. The main goal is to find one that covers all of your drugs for the least expense. In the case of a drug not being covered by any plan, you'll have to make a decision based on the rest of your drugs. Once you've joined a plan, you can ask your doctor to support you in an appeal for coverage of a drug not on the plan's formulary, if your doctor thinks it necessary for your medical condition. Or, with your doctor’s advice, you may be able to switch to a similar drug that is on the plan’s formulary.

15. If you wish to compare plans side by side, you can do this for three plans at a time. Check three boxes in the left column of the main plan list and click on the Compare button at the top or bottom of the list.

16. Is there any way of lowering the costs that you've seen in your search so far? There may well be, depending on the drugs you've selected. So this is another VERY IMPORTANT STEP in the process. On the main plan list, click on Lower this cost in the second column of the plan that most interests you. (Or click on a similar link that appears at the top of the plan's details page.) This brings up a page headed "Ways to Further Lower My Cost Share." If any of your drugs have a generic or a lower-priced brand-name drug that might be equally effective for your medical condition, this will be shown in the third column. The monthly costs for these drugs are shown in the fourth column. Such savings are sometimes substantial and can change the order of the least expensive plans for your drugs. For example, choosing the generic version of a brand-name drug could drop your copay to the Tier 1 level. Some plans charge nothing for drugs in this tier. So it would be worth comparing several plans again based on these lower-cost drugs. (To see how they change your overall costs, substitute the names of these drugs for your existing ones—and don't forget to remove your existing ones—on the list of your drugs shown on each of the plan details pages.) You should also discuss these lower-cost drugs with your doctor.

Things to bear in mind

• The Medicare Plan Finder is a sophisticated and useful computer tool, but not free of glitches and errors. When you've found the plan that looks best, check its details with the company that provides it.
• If you still have difficulty locating the information you need from the online Plan Finder, you can call Medicare's help line at 1-800-633-4227 and talk to a customer service representative who will do the same search and send you a printout of the results.
• The premiums and deductibles stated on the Plan Finder are those offered for 2008 and cannot be changed until the end of the year. But plans are allowed by law to alter the prices they charge for drugs on a weekly basis throughout the year. They can also switch drugs from one tier of charges to another (if Medicare approves)—which could raise or lower copays. Plans must notify enrollees of such changes 60 days in advance. However, if you are already taking a drug that is switched to a higher tier, your original copay will stay the same for the remainder of the year.
• Each plan has a network of preferred pharmacies, among which the charges for drugs vary slightly per prescription. Unless you have specified a particular pharmacy in your search, the drug costs for each plan shown on the Plan Finder represent an average of the charges at its preferred pharmacies in your area. As explained under step 13 (How costs vary among retail pharmacies), costs at pharmacies outside the plan's network are much higher than those at its preferred in-network pharmacies. If the plan you're considering seems to have "low" overall costs but has no in-network pharmacies convenient to you, consider its mail-order option or look at other plans with in-network pharmacies closer to where you live. In some cases, cost has to be weighed against convenience.
• Most plans set restrictions on certain drugs, as indicated under the "Drug Coverage Information" section of the plan details page. Here's what each of those restrictions (which are intended to hold down costs) means:
  
  Prior Authorization: Before the plan will cover a drug, your doctor must inform the plan that it is necessary to your medical condition to take this drug instead of a similar one that is less expensive.
  
  Quantity Limits: This does NOT mean that your supply of drugs will be cut off after a certain time. It means that when a drug should be taken only (for example) once a day for safety reasons, the plan will cover only a 30-day supply at a time (or a 90-day supply by mail order).
  
  
Step Therapy: The plan requires you to first try a less expensive drug that has been shown effective in treating the same condition. Again, your doctor can request an exception if the more expensive drug is necessary to your health.


• If your plan refuses your doctor's request for an "exception" to any of these requirements, you can appeal against the decision. Look at your plan's information packet, or go to its website, for information on how to appeal.
• If you already received exceptions from a plan in 2007, the plan must notify you of its policy for 2008. Some plans will "grandfather" your 2007 exceptions and continue them into 2008, so that you don't have to request them again. Some plans will require you to apply again by a given date. If you switch to another plan for 2008, however, you will likely have to go through the process of requesting exceptions, with your doctor's support, once again—unless you choose a new plan that covers the drug.

Other kinds of searches

• Extra Help: If you have a limited income and qualify for the Extra Help program under Part D, you should check the yes button in step 4 above and answer the questions that appear. It is IMPORTANT to answer these questions accurately, as your answers will determine the information that follows. For example, if you receive full Extra Help, the costs that appear will reflect the fact that you will pay no premium or deductible, have low copays for each of your drugs and will receive coverage throughout the year (no doughnut hole).
• Medicare Advantage Plans: People who prefer managed care should look at Medicare Advantage plans, which are alternatives to the traditional Medicare health program. Most offer a comprehensive package that includes health services and prescription drugs. But these should be judged according to the details of their medical coverage (e.g., hospital costs and which doctors are in the plan's network) as well as their costs and benefits for prescription drugs. To see drug details of these plans, in step 12 above click on View Medicare Health Plans at the top of the main plan list. To see details of medical services provided by these plans, start a new search by going to www.medicare.gov and clicking on Medicare Health Plans—2008 Plan Data.