Picture Better Health.
Understanding the health care law, one piece at a time.
Improving benefits for people with Medicare.
The health care law strengthens Medicare, offers people with Medicare a range of preventive services with no out-of-pocket costs, and provides discounts on prescription drugs, when in the coverage gap known as the "doughnut hole."
Medicare annual wellness visit and prevention plan
The law protects your guaranteed Medicare benefits and covers annual wellness visits and screenings — designed to keep you as healthy as possible.
Your prevention plan may include:- A yearly wellness visit
- Screenings for diabetes, high cholesterol and certain cancers — these include mammograms, pap smears and colonoscopies
- An assessment of your health risks
- Your updated medical history
- A list of your current health care providers
- A list of your current prescription medications
- Measurement of your height, weight and blood pressure
- A screening schedule for appropriate preventive services that you can follow over five to 10 years
- A list of your health risk factors along with treatment options
Medicare Part D coverage gap or "doughnut hole"
The health care law helps make your Part D Medicare prescription drug coverage more affordable by gradually closing the gap in drug coverage known as the "doughnut hole."
Currently, people with Medicare Part D who fall into the prescription drug coverage gap will automatically receive a 50 percent discount on most brand name prescriptions, and a 14 percent discount on generic drugs. Those percentages will increase in 2013 to discounts of 52.5 percent on brand name drugs, and 21 percent on generic drugs. The savings will increase each year until the gap is closed in 2020.
As long as you are enrolled in a Medicare Part D plan, you don't need to do anything to get those benefits.
What is the doughnut hole? Most plans with Medicare prescription drug coverage (Part D) have a coverage gap, called the "doughnut hole." Before the health care law was passed, you had to pay all costs out-of-pocket for your prescriptions while in the doughnut hole, up to a yearly limit. Now, the doughnut hole will gradually disappear until it completely closes in 2020!