I wondered about that. Thanks for you're input. I'm not there yet, but I remember an elderly woman at church told me YEARS ago that she found she liked the regular, standard Medicare and then paid for a Medicare supplement and she was happy with her coverage. Her supplement might have been through Farm Bureau or AAA or something like that. She said the same thing...she went to the doctors and hospitals of HER choice, not some bureacratic M.D. or nurse practitioner who sits in a corporate insurance company building and hadn't seen patients in years!
a few additional points:
1. you should also have a supplemental plan to pay for hat basic medicare doesn’t pay for, which will be very substantial for a major illness. the supplemental plans are all standardized, so the cheapest one in a given category is the best as there’s no difference
2. Plan F and Plan G are the most comprehensive, essentially paying for everything not paid for by basic medicare (part A and Part B) ... Plan F is no longer offered for people born after a certain date, but Plan G is almost the same
3. In my state(and some others), the cheapest Plan F (and i assume Plan G) is AARP’s deal with United Health Care ... you have to join AARP, but it’s worth it to get their deal with United Health Care
4. The real bitch kitty is drug coverage when you don’t do medicare disadvantage, because you’ll also have to select and pay for a Plan D, which is a real nightmare (thank you very much, George Bush, you piece of shit), because there’s different formularies(list of covered drugs), tiers (different cost levels for different drug categories), amount of deductible, and the “doughnut hole” (a gap in the middle of maximum total payout that’s not covered)
here’s the best link i’ve found for comparing Plan D’s: