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Dawn, The recommendation to keep Craig on your insurance is good. However, the background info. from your agent needs further clarification. The only time that age is a factor is whether or not you are age 65 or older. If you are, you get Social Security and Medicare automatically. If you're not, you have to be on SSDI for 24 months to get Medicare. If you are covered by another policy, the penalties for not enrolling in Part B and Medigap are delayed until some time after your other health coverage ends (make sure you notify Medicare of your other coverage). There are eleven standard (nationally) Medigap policies. All Medicare beneficiaries must have access to at least the policy (or policies) with minimal coverage. State law determines which of the richer Medigap policies must be made available to Medicare beneficiaries. Only the top two Medigap policies have a prescription drug benefit, but the premiums are so high and the benefits are so limited that you must evaluate whether or not they are appopriate for you. Again, it sounds like the thing to do is to keep Craig on your insurance (assuming that it covers more than Medicare Part B and the Medigap policies that are available to you -- and almost any private prescription drug benefit is better than what's available from Medicare). Medicare Part A will cost you nothing and could supplement the benefits from your private plan. Hope this helps. Rees Jenkins ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn