Choosing a health insurance carrier for retirement next year (Bangor: university, deductible)

[westeasterly]

I'm retiring to the midcoast area in the spring of 2017 but I have to choose an insurance plan now. We are having open enrollment at work and the carrier I choose now will be the carrier I have (via Cobra) for my first year in Maine. I'm 60 so I have a ways to go before Medicare kicks in. Shoot, this sprang up sooner than I expected and I don't have enough information to make a selection.

I checked for providers using the carrier websites and I can see that there aren't many in-network choices unless I want to drive to, say, Augusta or beyond. But with that in mind, does anyone have any personal experience to share -- good or bad -- about medical or dental coverage from Metlife, Cigna, Aetna, United Healthcare and Delta Dental? I'll be somewhere between Damariscotta and Belfast, likely closest to Rockland or Camden. Thanks much.

[LarryLogger]

I am also retiring to Belfast next year or so. I will be insured under my retirement plan by Blue Cross / Blue Shield of South Carolina, as a retired state employee. We used to get a big "telephone book" sized directory of network doctors but now everything is online. I typed in "Belfast" and every doctor in the area plus Waldo General Hospital came up as "in network".

I was in Belfast last October and I stopped in at the hospital and went to their accounting office to see if I could really be considered "in network". The very nice woman typed in the number on my insurance card and my entire Health record appeared on her computer, including documentation of doctor visits in South carolina and the current status of my deductible. She said she was 99.99% sure that I would be covered but the only true way to know would be to incur an expense. Not caring to have a self-inflicted injury, I'll accept the 99.99%

Upon returning to SC (I'm a professor of forestry at Clemson University), I found out that Blue Cross / Blue Shield is basically one nation-wide group, at least based on my basic BC/BS employee plan. THree years later, I'll go on Medicare and the state plan becomes my supplemental plan

Thank god I don't have to go on Obamacare or Hillarycare and see my deductible raise from $450 to, from what I read, about $5000 per year

[slyfox2]

Since you are only 60, you are not getting the endless plans in the mail for supplementary to medicare.

I was on Cobra from my previous employer's HMO health plan to the tune of what the employer had to pay which was a total of $1600 a month for both of us. it was way cheaper than anything available in Maine. But now we are both on medicare and a supplemental to the tune of about 1/3 of what we paid on cobra.

You can probably get a COBRA payment into your current health plan if that's what it is. You will pay what Clemson has to pay for you.

[LarryLogger]

For a single person, I pay $110 per month for the Blue Cross/ Blue Shield Plan. $450 deductible and 20% co-pays for first $2000; $0 after that. A few years ago, I had a heart attack (near fatal) and incurred $185,000 in costs. Blew past the deductible and the $400 (20% of $2000) before the ambulance left my driveway. And that was all I paid. Going into retirement, as a vested (20+ years of service), it's the same plan. From retirement until age 65, I am an active member of the plan and will continue to pay $110 per month. At age 65, I go on Medicare and the BC/BS becomes my supplemental insurance, still at the $110 per month.

I still have ~1.5 years to become vested or I'd already be retired and living back in Maine. Might even get married again and find out the my monthly payments double to $220!

Like everyone else over age 50, I do get the endless and continuous junk mail from AARP

[Hollytree]

Make sure you can actually get an available doctor or dentist in that area. Maine is very low on healthcare professionals.

[Jellybean50]

Originally Posted by Hollytree

Make sure you can actually get an available doctor or dentist in that area. Maine is very low on healthcare professionals.

Is it hard to find a doctor that accepts Medicare? I guess i will have to research more.

I am moving from NJ to Maine in a year or so and have Medicare as primary and Blue Cross/Blue Shield as secondary.

[90077]

Originally Posted by Jellybean50

Is it hard to find a doctor that accepts Medicare? I guess i will have to research more.

I am moving from NJ to Maine in a year or so and have Medicare as primary and Blue Cross/Blue Shield as secondary.

You can search here for specialties or medical conditions by Maine city. Lists MDs that accept Medicare (or may). Note that it can take some months for new MDs who join to be listed.

https://www.medicare.gov/physiciancompare/search.html

[Jellybean50]

Thanks very much.

[westeasterly]

Thanks for the replies. With so few providers in the area, do people just have to wait a long time for appointments? I don't want to speculate about the quality of care. I am supremely spoiled by the abundance of excellent care where I live now.

This experience is helping me refine my search area in that I'm now focusing closer to town and trying to skip over places that are too far down the peninsulas since I may need to go further for routine care than I was hoping. Today was the deadline for open enrollment so I chose Cigna for medical and dental.

@LarryLogger: It's a pity that our Blue Cross/Blue Shield plan is not a national one. It sounds like great coverage you have there.

@Slyfox: I am overrun with old people marketing. AARP doesn't miss a beat. They know who their people are.

[slyfox2]

Where in Maine are you moving? On MDI which has access to an award winning health care system(which I just learned when I was bitten and developed both anaplasmosis and Lyme diseases), and access the Maine Medical in Bangor, they take both medicare and my supplemental.

But dentist is another story. Dentists up here are few and they charge way more than doctors. A root canal in PA was about $600-800. Here its $3000. Its more cost effective to have an extraction and an implant. I just got a dental insurance on my pension insurance system, and had to switch from my dentist who takes no insurance the the MDI hospital system because the dental cost will be about 5/8 of what it is with my favorite dentist who takes no insurance.

But the question is whether you are moving to the coast or deep in the interior.