Medicare Advantage (MA), also called Medicare Part C, plans are growing in popularity among Medicare beneficiaries. In part, this is because the premiums are lower than traditional Medicare. However, with lower premiums come more aggressive controls on who and what patients can access in terms of tests, specialists, and treatments. CLL Society is invested in sharing information with our patient community about how lower premiums may not translate to robust insurance coverage while making every effort to improve these increasingly popular plans.
Towards this end, CLL Society partnered with Haystack Project to provide CMS our perspective on Medicare Advantage plans. Comments focused on the need to:
- Monitor MA plan practices as the IRA’s negotiated drug prices roll out in 2026;
- Increase oversight of MA plans’ use of prior authorization practices for prescriptions; and
- Prioritize the collection of data on these plans’ approach to making every treatment option available to patients.
See page 9 for a particular example of MA practices in CLL.
