Medicare Advantage Patients

Historically, Medicare, healthcare insurance for seniors aged 65 and over, has not covered dental care in the United States. In the past several years though, Medicare Part C, also known as Medicare Advantage has become more common. Medicare Advantage (MA) plans have a regular health insurance component, and many times also include other perks including dental care, prescription drug coverage, and eye care plans. There are many MA plans out there, and they are usually sold state by state.

If you are considering signing up for a MA plan that includes dental care, we have tried to evaluate the dental care options as they relate to our office. It gets complicated fairly quickly when looking through these dental benefit plans.

The general tips for dental care at our office are that the Aetna and Delta Dental of Iowa (BCBS) dental plans are pretty good options if you are selecting a plan through Medicare Advantage. The United Healthcare and Humana Medicare Advantage dental plans are not as good at our office since we are not preferred providers for these plans. This is because the reimbursement rates are too low for us to accept them. You can still come to our office, just understand that they will pay about half of what the better MA options will pay. Since we are not preferred providers for these 2 plans, you will be required to pay the difference, which is usually about 50% of the cost of treatment.

We’ve included a downloadable document that shows more of the plan specifics for these Medicare Advantage dental plans available in Iowa. You can download it here.