Wisconsin seniors air Part D horror stories

From the Green Bay (WI) Press-Gazette:

Teresa Garbrecht says seniors worry about prescription drug costs and which medications Medicare will pay for.

    So she went to a session sponsored by the Coalition of Wisconsin Aging Groups on Monday at the SC Grand Banquet and Convention Center looking for answers.

    She was one of about 25 to attend the forum of District 4 of the coalition, which is held twice a year. The focus of the meetings is to hear what seniors have on their minds in order to form a list of priorities.

    The new Medicare D drug plan is high on the list, said Garbrecht, a senior who lives near Crivitz.

    “There are problems,” she said. “I belong to senior citizens groups and I hear people talk about how prices are different, and how certain drugs are not going to be covered, even for things like cancer.”

    The new plan confounds many seniors, said Elizabeth Conrad, Medicare Integrity Project director for the coalition’s Elder Law Center.

    In one case, a woman waited for up to four hours while on hold with her insurance company, only to be told she could not speak to a supervisor. A Medicare specialist also was unavailable.

    Another client who signed up for another company’s stand-alone drug plan was issued a card in which her name was spelled wrong and her pharmacy refused to accept the inaccurate card.

    When she first contacted her insurance company, she was told they couldn’t verify either the correct or incorrect spelling. She tried to contact customer service again, and was put on hold for 45 minutes. She tried an enrollment line, and was put on hold for 20 minutes.

    Eventually she was told it was because her name was too long (nine letters.) She also reports being pressured by a representative from the company to buy a more expensive plan.

    “We’ve heard lots of stories of rudeness, people being cut off or being fed wrong information,” Conrad said. “It’s getting better, but it’s still happening.”

    Part of the problem is that with so many people attempting to sign up by a January deadline, customer service lines were overwhelmed, she said.

    “There also were problems with identification theft,” Conrad said. “People would call pretending to be from Medicare and people would give them personal information that would be used for fraud.”

    Conrad said she worries that people don’t know what they’re buying.

    Rod Bohn, District 4 chairman, said the coalition hopes to influence legislators about issues like Medicare by banding smaller groups together.

    Advocates for seniors, the disabled and dependent care, as well as individuals are members of the grass-roots and non-partisan coalition, he said. District 4 has about 800 members, he said. Although 25 went to Monday’s session, he said the meetings usually attract 50 to 60 guests. A few state legislators also usually attend, he said.

    Ideas are gathered at similar meetings of the coalition’s nine districts. Organizers then will put together the group’s platform to be used in discussions with state and federal legislators.

    The group supports universal health care, a patient’s bill of rights and federal legislation to allow Medicare recipients to receive the same discounts on drug prices as other large purchasers, such as the federal government.

    Such measures will be difficult, said participant Pat Finder-Stone, unless things change on Capitol Hill.

    “The insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies have tremendous lobbyists in Washington, D.C.,” she said. “What we need is campaign finance laws. These laws will never get passed until lobbyists have less power.”