Medicare Wellness Exam: Convincing you to keep it local
Are you on a Medicare insurance plan? Is your mailbox filling with advertisements to complete a free wellness exam? Every calendar year Medicare highly recommends an “Annual Medicare Wellness Exam” for each subscriber. These visits are to ensure all appropriate screenings have been completed. The majority of primary care offices see patients for these visits regularly. However external organizations are also offering similar services to patients via a temporary clinic or in local pharmacies. They are often advertised through letters emails TV commercials or phone calls that can be confusing for some individuals. Medicare covers only one wellness visit per calendar year so how do you choose where to complete the exam?
Although other organizations may provide equivalent services in some cases consider the benefits of completing your annual Medicare wellness exam with your primary care provider (PCP).
- Personalized Care: your PCP has an established relationship with you and will be able to tailor the services for you as an individual.
- Past Medical History: your primary care office has access to your medical record medical history and current list of conditions that you are managing. That detailed information will directly affect their medical decisions to provide the best available services for you.
- Consistency: Labs and radiology images are already established in the electronic record of your PCP. If any tests or bloodwork are needed your primary care office can order complete and follow up on the results and start treatment if necessary.
- Streamlined process: If any abnormal findings occur on the tests your PCP will refer you to a specialist for follow up and/or discuss any necessary treatments with you directly rather than waiting for a report from outside clinics and then scheduling a visit with you to discuss the next steps.
- Access to local services: your PCP may have a broader knowledge of local services for Medicare patients as well as medical resources to support your healthy lifestyle.
Remember that Medicare covers only one “Annual Wellness Visit” per year so if you complete a visit at a local pharmacy via a telemarketer or another traveling clinic Medicare will not cover a wellness visit at your primary care office. Regardless of where you choose to complete your exam it is important that you complete the wellness visit annually. This allows you to receive the best and most comprehensive care available. This also helps to ensure that you have access to many of the services for Medicare subscribers. If you have any questions regarding the Medicare wellness visit and services please contact your primary care office or visit the Medicare website listed below.
Reid Health is always right beside you when making the right decisions for your health and wellbeing. Please each out to any of our offices including New Castle and Hagerstown.