Tricare prime

Anyone know for fact the tricare prime system is about to get horrible us retirees
we live outside the 50 mile cachmant. to stay in prime according to the military .com site
i wrote my congressman about how can the gov require me to live within 50 miles of a military treatment facility.
i love tricare prime as I am a sick person and see the doc ALOT
i can use the VA for 100% but driving three hrs to see a doc is nuts
so i use tricare prime for my local stuff and the va for dental which is twice a year
tricare standard is pricey to say the least for us

Military hospitals have always been 'space available' for retired. But it seems the hospitals and clinics are getting filled with guys returning from deployment.

This same issue happened about ten years ago in NE - and we had to drop MTF in Newport RI ...

Tell you tho', you can still use Prime, you just need a civilian Prime team. Or, you can go the standard, and when we have the choice, we used standard anyway, so you can use any doctor anywhere. And, there is a cap ($1500 per person I think) and so no matter what the annual costs become, it's still capped. (Cap might be $3000 per family, but I think it's less.

I didn't understand the original post until I read what appears to be a new plan to limit where TRICARE Prime is available. This should be a warning to all of us that all of the TRICARE coverage including TRICARE for Life is not guaranteed. Here is the info I just read.


171K May Soon Lose TRICARE Prime

Week of November 12, 2012

Defense officials are expected to announce that military retirees and their dependents that live more than 40 miles from a military treatment facility or BRAC (base closure) site will lose access to TRICARE Prime as early as next April. This move could force as many as 171,000 retirees to shift to TRICARE Standard, which would mean an increase in out-of-pocket costs--especially those with special needs dependents or other chronic health issues. The first round of Prime service changes is "tentatively" planned to go into effect in the West region on April 1. The North and South regions will see the plan implemented by October 1, 2013.

Have not read this anywhere yet, thanks for the heads up on forthcoming changes. If you recall please let us know where you read this Nov. article, we are on the road so could be in a mag or newsletter waiting for us in the mail.

Remember how Obama promised your health care wouldn't change once Obamacare was passed? Of course, he'd defend this forced move off Tricare Prime (we live 47 miles from a military hospital and will lose our benefits) by saying it's a DoD decision. In any event, we who sacrificed so much will be paying a lot more for our health care than those who have done nothing for America.

For us, two primary care appointments, two sets of lab work, a mammogram and cardio work can be expected to cost us over $600 out of pocket next year, something that under Prime would cost us $36. Let all the young people you know that joining the military is not worth it.

Who did you vote for?

The first I heard about it was from the FedWeek mailing list almost two weeks ago. Looks like it will be implemented in the Tricare West Region on 1 April 2013 and in the North and South Regions 1 October 2013. First they raise the price, then they start throwing us out. You can tell the wars are winding down. Here is a link to a small blurb about it on their web site.

www.fedweek.com/item-view.php?tbl=4&ID=3495