Medicare Advantage (MA) is a health insurance program that provides an eligible person with the United States' Medicare benefits. Medicare Advantage differs from the original Medicare model, which offered a standard plan provided directly by the state. In contrast, Medicare Advantage is offered by a private provider.
The term originated with the passage of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997, which offered Medicare beneficiaries this option, instead of receiving these benefits through the original Medicare plan (Parts A and B). These programs were known as Medicare+Choice or Part C plans.
Pursuant to the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003, the compensation and business practices changed for insurers that offer these plans, and "Medicare+Choice" plans became known as Medicare Advantage plans.
Read more about Medicare Advantage: Overview, Effects of The Health Reform, What Is Being Measured?, Where Does The Information For The Overall Plan Rating Come From?
Famous quotes containing the word advantage:
“Nothing could his enemies do but it rebounded to his infinite advantage,—that is, to the advantage of his cause.... No theatrical manager could have arranged things so wisely to give effect to his behavior and words. And who, think you, was the manager? Who placed the slave-woman and her child, whom he stooped to kiss for a symbol, between his prison and the gallows?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)