DUMMIES

Medicare Prescription Drug Coverage

FOR

By Patricia Barry

WILEY

Wiley Publishing, Inc.

Medicare Prescription Drug Coverage

FOR

By Patricia Barry

WILEY

Wiley Publishing, Inc.

Medicare Prescription Drug Coverage For Dummies®

Published by

Wiley Publishing, Inc.

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Copyright © 2008 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana Published simultaneously in Canada

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2008935260

ISBN: 978-0-470-27676-1

Manufactured in the United States of America

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About the Author

Patricia Barry Is a recognized expert on Medicare and its Part D prescription drug coverage. As a senior editor of the AARP Bulletin — the newspaper and Web site that serve AARP’s 40 million members — she’s written extensively about Medicare from the consumer’s point of view since 1999. That year, she went to a press conference at the White House to hear President Bill Clinton announce his proposal to add outpatient prescription drugs to Medicare and came away thinking: "This story has legs — it’ll run and run." For the next four years, she covered the bitter political battles in Washington that finally led to President George W. Bush signing Part D into law in December 2003.

Ever since, Patricia’s mission has been to explain the controversial and complicated benefit to consumers. She’s written numerous articles and guides on navigating Part D for AARP publications and books. Before and after the drug benefit went into effect in 2006, she invited readers’ questions and personally answered hundreds of them. She continues to do so through the Bulletin’s Web site (Bulletin. aarp. org). Patricia has directly helped many, many people — readers, friends, neighbors, and colleagues’ parents — find the Part D plan that suits them best. Those questions and experiences are the foundation of Medicare Prescription Drug Coverage For Dummies.

In her long journalism career in Europe and America, Patricia has written thousands of newspaper and magazine articles and three books. A native of Great Britain, she’s lived since 1985 in Maryland, where she and her husband raised three adventurous children — Katerina (currently living in Russia), Jessica (in France), and Oliver (in Egypt). In 2006, not without a sense of mutinous disbelief, Patricia became a Medicare beneficiary herself.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to the hundreds of older or disabled Americans who so generously shared their personal Part D stories with me since Medicare prescription drug coverage began. You told me what it was like on the front lines — experiences that were good, bad, and occasionally downright ugly. You prompted me to find answers to questions I hadn’t thought of asking. You gave me the motivation to write this book, and I couldn’t have done it without your insights. You were the consumer pioneers of Part D. To each and every one — a huge thank you!

Author’s Acknowledgments

Writing this book has been a roller coaster grounded by the expertise and wisdom of many people who kept me on track. My thanks go to experts at two key federal agencies, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and the Social Security Administration, who helped me through the labyrinth of regulations that govern the Part D program and patiently answered hundreds of questions I threw at them. I’m also indebted to experts at the consumer help organizations who daily assist Medicare beneficiaries with Part D issues: the Medicare Rights Center, the Center for Medicare Advocacy, California Healthcare Advocates, and the State Health Insurance Assistance Programs.

I’m especially grateful for the advice and generously shared knowledge of many colleagues at AARP: David Gross, Gerry Smolka, Paul Cotton, Ed Dale, Lee Rucker, Elinor Ginzler, and, above all, Joyce Dubow, a national expert who for many years has been my guru on all things Medicare. I thank my editors at the AARP Bulletin, Jim Toedtman and Susan Crowley, for their encouragement and forbearance when I needed to take time out — and my former editors, Elliot Carlson and Bob Hey, who first twisted my arm to take on the Bulletin’s Medicare beat.

I’m enormously grateful to my project editor on this book, Georgette Beatty, and copy editors Vicki Adang and Jen Tucci at John Wiley & Sons, who have been a pleasure to work with. Also to Vicki Gottlich, of the Center for Medicare Advocacy, for her profound knowledge of Part D and vigilant eye while acting as technical adviser during the book’s draft stages. And to my superb agent, Maureen Watts, who got this ball rolling.

Finally, to my children (who urged me on when I felt daunted by the task) and to my husband (whose devotion ran to cooking dinner every night for months), I can only say: What would I do without you?

Publisher’s Acknowledgments

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Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:

Acquisitions, Editorial, and Media Development

Senior Project Editor: Georgette Beatty

Acquisitions Editor: Stacy Kennedy

Senior Copy Editor: Victoria M. Adang

Copy Editor: Jennifer Tucci

Assistant Editor: Erin Calligan Mooney

Technical Editor: Vicki Gottlich, Center for Medicare Advocacy

Editorial Manager: Michelle Hacker

Editorial Assistants: Joe Niesen, Jennette ElNaggar

Cover Photo: Jose Luis Pelaez, Inc.

Cartoons: Rich Tennant

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Composition Services

Project Coordinator: Katherine Key

Layout and Graphics: Reuben W. Davis, Melissa K. Jester, Christin Swinford, Stephanie D. Jumper, Christine Williams

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Indexer: Broccoli Information Management

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