Medicare Supplement Insurance Plans
A Medicare Supplement (Medigap) insurance is sold by private companies. It can help pay some of the health care costs that original Medicare doesn’t cover. Some examples of this include copayments, coinsurance, and deductibles.
Some Medigap policies also offer services that the original Medicare plan doesn’t cover. This can include medical care when you travel outside of the U.S. If you have original Medicare and you try to buy a Medigap policy, Medicare will pay its share of the Medicare approved amount for covered healthcare costs. Then your Medigap policy pays its share.
A Medigap policy is different from a Medicare Advantage Plan. Those plans are ways to get Medicare benefits, while Medigap policies only supplement your Original Medicare benefits.
Medigap Policies Don’t Cover Everything
Medigap policies generally don’t cover long-term care, vision or dental care, hearing aids, eyeglasses, or private duty nursing.
Insurance Plans That Aren’t Medigap
Some types of insurance are not Medigap plans. These include the following:
- Medicare Advantage Plans (i.e. HMO’s PPO, or Private Fee For Service Plans)
- Medicare Prescription Drug Plans
- Medicaid
- Employer or union plans, including the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHB)
- Tricare
- Veterans benefits
- Long-term care insurance policies
- Indian Health Service, Tribal, and Urban Indian Health plans.