Executive Director's Message


The new Medicare Drug Discount program is now in place. We have received calls at the medical society regarding the plan, and I am sure that your patients are asking you questions about the program and whether they should join? We hope that this information will help you and your staff to readily answer questions patients have or to direct them to where they can secure accurate information.

The most important message for seniors on the Medicare Drug Discount Program is that the program is voluntary. Those with better benefits through their employer’s retirement plan will want to continue with that plan. The program is an intermediate step being offered until Jan. 1, 2006, when Medicare’s new prescription benefit begins.

Seventy Medicare-approved drug discount cards are being offered nationally. Any person is eligible who has Medicare Part A and/or Part B and who doesn’t have an outpatient prescription drug benefit (such as Medicaid or an employer group health plan). The cost to Medicare beneficiaries is $30 annually. Available beginning in June, the cards provide seniors with discounts on their prescription medication. Anticipated savings to seniors using the cards are 10 to 25 percent. According to Mark McClellan, MD, PhD, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the card benefits may be larger than those available to seniors through other sources because the companies offering the cards are requiring discounts from the pharmaceutical manufacturers.

Additional benefits are offered for low-income seniors with incomes of $12,569 or less for singles, or $16,862 or less for a married couple. The $30 annual card cost is waived and these Medicare patients will receive a $600 credit on their Medicare-approved drug discount card to use to pay for prescriptions. Low-income seniors will also receive assistance accessing the free prescription drug programs that are available through the mail from the pharmaceutical manufacturers.

CMS Director, Dr. McClellan described the information sources available to Medicare patients. Help is available 24 hours a day at 1-800-MEDICARE (800-633-5227). We’ve all heard that the phone lines have been overwhelmed, but Dr. McClellan stated that they now have more than 2,000 people staffing the lines and the waiting time has gone down significantly, particularly for those who call on Thursday through Sunday. The Medicare Web site is www.medicare.gov. Both the toll free phone call and the Web site are designed to help seniors’ comparison shop for their individual medications. By providing their zip code, medications, and how far they are willing to travel to a pharmacy (or the name of the pharmacy they use), the patient can determine which drug card best serves their specific needs. Assistance is also available through the Area Agencies on Aging.

There are two ways to access more information that we hope will help your patients:
www.medicare.gov on this site patients can use a price comparison feature that allows them to compare prices of drugs offered by cards based on entering their individual characteristics on drug utilization, their location, and how far they are willing to travel to a pharmacy. The price comparison feature will also list pharmacies in the patients’ area that accept each card.

Patients without Internet access may also call 1-800-Medicare. Patients will receive the same information provided on the Web site. A representative will ask patients the same questions posed on the Web site and mail a personalized booklet showing their choices of drug cards based on their individual characteristics. For faster service, Medicare advises patients to have their medicines in front of them to more quickly answer questions.

We hope this overview will make it easier for you to answer questions posed by patients as they evaluate the Medicare Drug Prescription Program.