Broken Coverage

The announcement that PeaceHealth is no longer going to be in network for any of the Medicare advantage plans offered by Health Net came as a bit of a shock to me.

Looking at the Medicare booklet for 2020, it seems like Health Net was the only plan that works in both Lane and Douglas counties, where I will be living off and on over the next few months. I called Health Net to find out my options and they offered to sign me up for their “violet plan” that doesn’t charge extra to cover out-of-network doctors and hospitals.

But then I called PeaceHealth, and they said I won’t be able to use Health Net to pay for their services even with out-of-network billing. So now it looks like my main option is to sign up for a plan that works in Lane County and use urgent care in Douglas County for up to six months if needed.

You can get the complete list of plans by answering a few questions at Medicare.gov. Although the emails being circulated suggest logging in to view the list, logging in is not actually required.

The deadline to switch is Dec. 7.

John Thielking

Eugene