Page 4 - Cover Letter and Evaluation for Mike Peaseley

There’s another Aetna Advantage PPO plan in your area – the Aetna Medicare Value
PPO plan. It has zero health premiums but a $750 health plan deductible. Its costs and
benefits are listed alongside those of the Aetna Medicare Select PPO Plan in Appendix
C2, in case you want to choose the lower-premium plan. Also, these two Aetna plans’ Rx
drug coverage benefits are shown side-by-side in Appendix D3.

2) Aetna Medicare Value HMO Plan. This plan has the lowest fixed costs of any of the
options in your evaluation. Its prescription drug costs, for example, are $400 less than
the lowest-cost Part D stand-alone plan that you would get if you choose a Medigap
policy. Also, it has no premiums and no deductible for medical coverage. And it has a
large (for an HMO) network of more than 16,000 providers.

The key to saving money in an HMO is to see only doctors in the plan’s network. When
you go outside the network, you will likely pay the full cost unless it’s an emergency.
Also, in HMO’s you will likely need to get referrals from your primary care phsycian in
order to see a specialist. By restricting care in this way, HMO’s hold their costs down and
can pass on some of those savings to retirees.

Rx Drug Plan Coverage

You might check the list of your Rx drugs and dosages that is attached to this letter to verify
their accuracy. If you continue to get monthly refills at a local pharmacy, you will get much
lower prices at CVS or other preferred pharmacies in the plans below. Preferred pharmacies for
each plan are shown on page 4 of your evaluation. Each plan’s estimated costs are its total
costs – premiums, deductibles, and co-payments.

Part D Stand-Alone Plan

If you decide to get a Medigap policy, the lowest-cost plan for your Rx drugs is the SilverScript
Choice prescription drug plan – that’s true whether you get monthly refills at CVS or mail-order
refills. You can save approximately $120 a year by using mail-order refills (Appendix D2).

Aetna Medicare Select PPO Plan

This plan’s estimated costs for your Rx drugs in 2018 are about $90 less than the SilverScript
Choice plan’s if you get monthly refills at CVS -- and about $50 more expensive than the
SilverScript Choice’s plan if you get mail-order refills.

Aetna Medicare Value HMO Plan

As noted, this is easily the least expensive option regardless of whether you continue to get
monthly or mail-order refills. Annual costs for monthly refills at CVS are $835, while costs for
mail-order refills are $856.

4