In an earlier Senior Side column this month, it was said that February has the distinction of being National Senior Independence Month. This week this column addresses how preventative care can aid in senior independent living.
Stating the obvious, preventive care can help anyone, especially senior members stay healthy and find medical problems before they get out of hand.
In 2010, the Affordable Care Act added preventive services for all Medicare beneficiaries. Before that, Medicare mainly focused on diagnosis and treatment, with few services aimed at prevention.
One of the ways a senior can get this done is through using these Medicare programs. Medicare offers several important preventive services like yearly wellness visits, screenings, and vaccines.
Medicare covers two types of yearly visits. The first one is like a Welcome to Medicare preventive visit and the second is a yearly wellness visit, or it’s also called the annual wellness visit.
These types of preventive visits are NOT head-to-toe physicals, but they are a great opportunity to make sure someone is up to date on important screenings and vaccines. These visits also allow the patient time to talk with their healthcare provider about family medical history and their own and to make a plan to stay as healthy as possible, for as long as possible thus, keeping an older person in their home.
These visits are recommended for everyone—whether someone that may already have a chronic condition or someone hoping to prevent one.
The Medicare preventive visits include reviewing your medical, social, and family history; discussing a preventive screening schedule based on your particular health conditions and risk factors; taking routine measurements like weight and blood pressure; discussing your risk of depression; doing a basic visual acuity screening; reviewing current opioid prescriptions and discussing the risk of opioid use disorders; screening for cognitive or memory problems; making referrals for screenings and other care; and helping with end-of-life planning.
If other screenings are needed, they will be scheduled separately and should be talked about to your healthcare provider to know the cost involved.
There is usually no cost for most preventive screenings; however, when and how often someone can get these services varies by person and screening.
Some screenings aren’t covered. For example, Medicare covers a one-time visual acuity screening but does not cover routine eye exams for contact lenses or eyeglasses.
There are many reasons why older Americans failed to visit the doctor. The most obvious is they don’t want to hear any bad news. The truth of the matter is in many cases it wouldn’t be as bad of news if the person had preventative care in place.
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