Affordable Care Act made many preventive services no cost to beneficiaries The Affordable Care Act - the new health care law - helped over 16 million people with original Medicare get at least one preventive service at no cost to them during the first six months of 2012, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced on July 10. This includes 1.35 million who have taken advantage of the Annual Wellness Visit provided by the Affordable Care Act. In 2011, 32.5 million people in Medicare received one or more preventive benefits free of charge. Prior to 2011, people with Medicare faced cost-sharing for many preventive benefits such as cancer screenings. Through the Affordable Care Act, preventive benefits are offered free of charge to beneficiaries, with no deductible or co-pay, so that cost is no longer a barrier for seniors who want to stay healthy and treat problems early.
The law also added an important new service for people with Medicare - an Annual Wellness Visit with the doctor of their choice- at no cost to beneficiaries. For more information on Medicare-covered preventive services, please visit Healthcare.gov<http://www.healthcare.gov/law/features/65-older/medicare-preventive-services/index.html>. To learn what screenings, vaccinations and other preventive services doctors recommend for you and those you care about, please visit the myhealthfinder tool at healthfinder.gov<http://www.healthfinder.gov>. Full text of this excerpted CMS press release<http://www.cms.gov/apps/media/press/release.asp?Counter=4407&intNumPerPage=10&checkDate=&checkKey=&srchType=1&numDays=3500&srchOpt=0&srchData=&keywordType=All&chkNewsType=1%2C+2%2C+3%2C+4%2C+5&intPage=&showAll=&pYear=&year=&desc=&cboOrder=date> (issued July 10). ________________________________ If you know someone who would like to subscribe to a Medicare Fee-For-Service (FFS) provider listserv, go to http://www.cms.gov/Outreach-and-Education/Medicare-Learning-Network-MLN/MLNProducts/downloads//MailingLists_FactSheet.pdf<http://www.cms.gov/Outreach-and-Education/Medicare-Learning-Network-MLN/MLNProducts/downloads/MailingLists_FactSheet.pdf> and select the appropriate listserv to subscribe. If you would like to unsubscribe from a specific provider listserv, please go to (https://list.nih.gov/cgi-bin/wa.exe?INDEX) to unsubscribe or to leave the appropriate listserv. Please DO NOT respond to this email. This email is a service of CMS and routed through an electronic mail server to communicate Medicare policy and operational changes and/or updates. Responses to this email are not routed to CMS personnel. Inquiries may be sent by going to (http://www.cms.gov/About-CMS/Agency-Information/ContactCMS/index.html). Thank you.
