Medicare For Dummies

Medicare For Dummies®, 2nd Edition

Published by: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774, www.wiley.com

Copyright © 2015 by AARP. All rights reserved. AARP is a registered trademark.

Published simultaneously in Canada

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2015945379

ISBN 978-1-119-29339-2 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-119-29658-4 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-119-29659-1 (ebk)

Medicare For Dummies, 2nd Edition (9781119293392) was previously published as Medicare For Dummies, 2nd Edition (9781119079422). While this version features a new Dummies cover and design, the content is the same as the prior release and should not be considered a new or updated product.

For most people, turning 65 or otherwise becoming eligible for Medicare feels like stepping into alien territory without a map. The signposts you think should be there often aren’t immediately visible. When you ask for directions, you can’t always be sure you’re being pointed down the right path.

Medicare For Dummies, 2nd Edition, is the map you need. It gives accurate, practical information about Medicare in plain language. It shows you how to skirt pitfalls and avoid wrong turns that can cost you dearly. My goal is to help you make informed, confident decisions that take you where you want to be. How can I promise that? Because this book is, in essence, the result of thousands of questions I’ve received over the years from people just like you.

I know from many of those questions that people eligible for Medicare often receive incorrect information from sources – such as government officials – they should be able to trust. That’s why, in these pages, I not only give you info that’s firmly based in law but sometimes also identify certain specific regulations (by name, number, and website) that you can use if you need to prove to an official the legal authority for a particular point about eligibility, enrollment, late penalties, and so on. You can’t find these useful references, which I offer as a kind of consumer empowerment, in other guides.

Confusion about Medicare is almost inevitable for two main reasons. Its regulations apply to different people in different ways, according to their specific circumstances, so the decisions you need to make may be unlike the next person’s. Also, it offers an array of choices that can be bewildering if you don’t know how to sift through them to get to the one that’s right for you.

So think of your Medicare card as your passport into the terrain of guaranteed health care, where you’re welcome regardless of income or preexisting medical conditions, but you still have to find your way around. And consider this book the road map that helps you navigate the highways and some of the more obscure byways of that system and keeps you on track.