Medicare Supplemental Health Insurance for Seniors in New Hampshire

While Medicare offers coverage for the bulk of health care expenses for seniors, it doesn’t cover everything. Routine health care costs such as co-insurance and deductibles can add up and cause a strain on your budget. Medicare supplemental insurance, also referred to as Medigap, is designed to cover these ‘gaps’ in the Original Medicare Plan and minimize extra expenses. Having a Medigap policy means having less to worry about when it comes to staying healthy.

Fourteen Medigap policies are available for senior residents of New Hampshire, ranging from Medigap Plan A to Plan J. Policies are sold through private insurance companies, so each insurer has the ability to choose which policies to offer – for example, a company may choose to offer only five of the fourteen policies – and how much to charge for the monthly premiums.

The Medicare supplemental insurance plans themselves, however, are federally legislated and regulated by the government. This ‘standardization’ means that any Medigap policy you see at one insurance company in New Hampshire will offer benefits identical to those of the same plan at another insurer in the state (i.e. Plan C and Plan C).

Medigap Plan A offers the most basic benefits and the lowest premium of all the policies. Any insurer selling Medicare supplemental insurance policies to seniors in New Hampshire must sell at least Plan A.

Medigap Supplemental Health Insurance Policies A-J for Seniors in New Hampshire

The following basic benefits must be offered in all Medigap policies A-J:

• The first three pints of blood in each calendar year, unless that blood is replaced.
• The total cost of in-hospital care beyond the standard 150 days covered by Medicare, until a maximum of 365 lifetime days.
• Co-insurance for days 61-90 in the hospital ($265 per day in 2008), as well as co-insurance for your 60 lifetime reserve days.
• Co-insurance benefits of 20% for charged approved by Medicare after Medicare’s Part B annual deductible of $135 has been reached.

You are eligible for Medicare supplemental insurance plans in New Hampshire if you are a senior (age 65 or better) and resident in the state, and you are enrolled in Medicare Parts A and B.