Privately run fee-for-service Medicare plans that provide benefits without doctor or hospital restrictions are growing popular among U.S. seniors.
This growing market is encouraging some of the largest U.S. health insurers to launch similar Medicare Advantage PPFS plans, reports The Wall Street Journal.
The PPFS plan that brings doctor and hospital services in one package makes it easy for the federal government to let insurance companies manage the care and at the same time reduce its costs.
Seniors like them because costs for these plans are cheaper on average than those for traditional government-run Medicare, says the report. The new Medicare prescription-drug benefit program has made these plans even more attractive because of the government's reimbursement rates that allow for further reduction in the plans' premiums.
Avalere Health LLC, a healthcare advisory firm that analyzes Medicare data, says as of July, more than 7 million people were in some form of Advantage plan, or about 17 percent of all Medicare beneficiaries, says the Journal.
The report says in some parts of the country, PFFS plans are the first Advantage plans that have become available.
