US Medicare Part D users face "smooth transition"

The US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) claims that enrollees on the Medicare Part D seniors' prescription drug benefit (Marketletters passim) "should experience very few difficulties" in the current year. The annual enrollment period, which also allows patients to change providers, closed on December 31, 2007.

The Medicare drug program has reported high satisfaction levels since its 2006 launch (87% according to a Harris Interactive survey published in the Wall Street Journal), but there have been persistent reports by critics of confusion during the enrollment period. A particular concern has come from the relatively low participation of low-income beneficiaries, who are often allocated plans by default. Changes to the qualification thresholds in 2008 prompted the CMS to send letters using different color coding to low-income subsidy beneficiaries to indicate whether they would need to change plans to obtain free coverage, or if no action was required.

The federal government agency also reported that in excess of 347,000 people had signed up on-line for the Part D program during the November 15 to December 31, 2007, enrollment period. There had been over 19 million page-views on the Medicare Prescription Drug Finder and more than 100 million visits to the www.medicare.gov web site. Over 10,000 public events were also held to publicize the enrollment period. In 220 instances, the CMS hired mystery shoppers to check marketing and enrollment standards.