As the medical exchanges open up, so have the boiler rooms filled with Medicare experts fast-talking you into a Medicare plan that will likely cost you both in medical choice and in frustration when you attempt to use an out-of-state doctor. Do yourself a favor and ignore the sales pitch. You do not ever need to switch out of genuine Medicare. We blogged about why these plans are suspect. They often take a larger profit at the expense of your health, offer fewer provider choices, and, in many cases, pay doctors more poorly than Medicare itself. Medicare is the gold standard and to sign up, you only need to visit this site to understand the pitfalls and how to sign up on the genuine CMS site. There are people who you can use that can help you pick an adequate secondary plan and a plan for drugs if you choose to avoid the medicare donut hole. In my case, I chose AARP as my secondary which is one of the best and includes a gym membership for free. I also chose a plan by Wellcare that has no premium and a deductible as I rarely take any drugs. How to convince an aging public to buy an inferior insurance plan; the problem with Medicare Advantage Plans For both myself and my wife, my premiums under Medicare and secondary insurance were under 600 dollars a month, much less than what was paid with an Omnia plan which had a large deductible and a bait-and-switch tiered network. For us, this was amazing. If you are going to become 65, choose CMS Medicare and most consultants will do the rest for you. If you by accident are duped into Medicare Advantage, switching back to Medicare will be more costly but often worth it in the long run. Click on the link above for directions and links to sign up for Medicare. Answer the questions and its done. You should sign up within three months of your birthday and please don’t wait for the last minute. Choosing Medicare allows you to enter into a better system that is less costly, covers you in all 50 states, and is accepted by most doctors. It also is free of many of the precert and claims denial games common in Medicare Advantage. Recently, there has been a lot of mail trying to get us to change out of Medicare as well. Even Reuters recently published its own article about why you should be wary of these sales pitches based on some changes happening to Medicare drug plans. Our advice remains the same. Check out the Reuters article below You’ve got mail from Medicare Advantage, so be careful