Going on Medicaid, what's the best health plan? (New York, York: health insurance, unemployment)
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I've been unemployed and have have just gone on to the Federal extension. I went for 6 months prior with no health insurance.
I made a low wage when I was working so now I'm told that while getting this even lower income from unemployment I am probably eligable for medicaid.
While at a mandatory lecture at an unemployment office on the topic of how to search for jobs they also had a healthplan representive from United Healthcare who can also sign you up to Medicaid.
But if I sign up with him he's going try to get me to join United Healthcare.
I assume I have to have sign up with one of these health plan companies in order to use my medicaid(although it might be technically "Family helath plus" rather than medicaid proper)
I don't know much about it yet have a meeting in two days with this guy. He assures me I can easily change to a different company's health plan if I want to.
I'm not certain if the following are all the health plans in Manhattan I could sign up with that work with medicaid but here's some:
Affinity Health Plan
Amerigroup Community Care
Fidelis/NYS Catholic Health
Health First PHSP, Inc.
HealthPlus, Inc.
HIP
MetroPlus Health Plan
Neighborhood Health Providers Inc.
United Healthcare DBA Americhoice
^^^ Do you recommend any of these?
I'm not expecting a lot of quality getting Medicaid.
I had Fidelis maybe 15 years ago and I think HIP before that
I recall Fidelis not being very good
I used to have United Health Care and wish I had them now. Of course, I don't know what your particular plan covers. Many of the doctors that I liked and used were part of United's network and I had to stop going to them when I switched insurance companies. Also, some plans do not have coverage out of state, but United Healthcare is big so I didn't have to worry about that when I traveled.
I'm not expecting a lot of quality getting Medicaid.
Don't kid yourself. It's bettter than a lot of plans.
Last dentist cost me $210 for an extraction...the woman before me had work done for herself AND her kid...no cost, she was on Medicaid.
^Most of those programs you listed are fine. You would be surprised at how many doctors accept those insurance plans and how little your co-pays will be.
BTW-Back when I was a poor kid, we had HIP and then we had Child Health Plus/Family Health Plus. I had easy access to many doctors and the co-pays were like $10 or $15 or something for general visits. I didn't really go to any specialists so I can't vouch for that but I never had trouble finding doctors/getting appointments otherwise.
I need to change my Medicare from blue care to amerigroup???? Lord please help me get this changed to cover the Dr and medications that I'm on thank you
I had medicaid and started with someone else, then switched to MetroPlus and was glad I did. I recommend them. I dis-recommend United Healthcare and anything affiliated with them as strongly as humanly possible.
And like someone said above, don't kid yourself. Medicaid can be head and shoulders above the ripoff crap we paid bundles for before. I also expected to be treated like a second-class citizen, but there are so many people on medicaid now that that was a really unfounded concern. I felt I got more respect in the public hospital system than I ever did from all those private thieves.
If you want to use public hospitals in the HHC a system such as Bellevue, Metropolitan, Kings County, Woodhull, Lincoln Jacobi and many others... go with MetroPlus. NYC Public hospital system launched MetroPlus themselves and it works seamlessly within that system:
If you are going for healthcare anywhere else for healthcare, get Healthfirst. My experience is that they have the best customer service, the least ridiculous bureaucracy, and are almost universally accepted because they are the largest plan.
Many places do not take Affinity or United Healthcare I have found. They also have some some silly bureaucratic rules. For instance Every other plan besides affinity; when you go to the doctor they will give you a metrocard. With affinity, you have to call 10 days ahead of an appointment and they mail it to you 3 days after your appointment if at all.
Almost nobody has HealthPlus, Amerigroup, or Neighborhood.
Some people have Fidelis, it's OK coverage but really bad customer service I've waited 45 minutes on the phone trying to get through to customer service.
This is just my experience dealing with plans as a Case Manager
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