Page 2 - Cover Letter and Evaluation for Nobuko Christy

drugs that you take are shown on page 4 and in Appendix C2 and Appendix C3.
The plan’s toll-free enrollment numbers are shown on page 4.

Health Savings Accounts

You indicated on your questionnaire that you have already enrolled in Part A and are also
contributing to a Health Savings Account. The HSA rules are that you cannot be enrolled in
either Part A or Part B while contributing to an HSA. A copy of the rule is attached to this letter.

Your physicians’ network affiliations

Your dental care providers – Drs. Chang, Cooper, and Estrada – probably do not accept
Medicare because it does not cover dental care, and they are not listed in Medicare’s provider
directory. Your four physicians accept Medicare-approved rates, as shown in Appendix A1.

When a doctor charges more than the approved rates, Plans F and G in your evaluation will
cover the added charge but Plan N does not. Since all your medical doctors accept approved
rates, this isn’t an issue. And in those cases in which a doctor accepts Medicare but does not
accept Medicare-approved rates, he or she can charge only 15% more than the approved rates.
In most cases that turns out to be a few dollars, although for expensive treatments it will be
higher.

Four options compared in your evaluation

Your evaluation compares an Advantage PPO plan with three Medigap plans. I was unable to
find an Advantage plan that includes all your medical doctors in its network. I did not look at
the provider directories of all 44 plans, but I did look at the most widely sold plans – those
sponsored by Humana, SCAN, AARP, etc. -- as shown on the first page of Appendix A2. The
network directories are not always current, of course. Probably the best way to find out which
Advantage plans a doctor accepts is to call his/her office and ask.

Since I was unable to find any Advantage HMO plan that includes all four of your medical
doctors, the only remaining option is an Advantage PPO plan where there is some coverage for
out-of-network visits. There’s only one Advantage PPO plan in Los Angeles County – the Aetna
Medicare Choice PPO Plan – and it’s compared in your evaluation. Dr. Bowns is the only one of
your medical doctors who is not listed in this plan’s network – but ironically, he is listed in every
other plan and so it’s possible he is also in this plan’s network. If your interested in this PPO
plan, you can call his office to see if he’s in the network.

The three Medigap plans in your evaluation

Before summarizing the three Medigap plans in your evaluation, it might be helpful to review
some features that all Medigap policies share (you may already be aware of these). These

2