Enrolling in a Medicare Advantage plan can give you access to benefits that you won't find in traditional Medicare, including vision, dental and hearing coverage. These supplementary benefits can help you save a substantial amount of money on your overall healthcare costs.

The additional benefits that Medicare Advantage offers over traditional Medicare don't stop there, however. Some plans offer non-medical benefits that are designed to help you manage chronic conditions or disabilities.

Non-medical benefits help keep you healthy and out of the hospital, which is good for both you and the insurance company. The insurance company will spend less money covering the cost of emergency medical care. At the same time, they'll help improve your health and quality of life. To learn more about non-medical benefits that can be found in Medicare Advantage plans, read on.

Food and Grocery Delivery

Some chronic conditions require you to adjust your diet in order to manage them. If you have heart failure, kidney disease, or high blood pressure, for example, your doctor may have recommended that you eat a low-sodium diet. Adjusting your diet can help improve symptoms of these chronic diseases and stop them from progressing.

To adjust your diet, you'll need convenient access to healthy food. Some Medicare Advantage plans offer regular deliveries of meals and groceries as part of their non-medical benefits, and some even offer cooking classes that can teach you how to cook food that's part of the diet you've been prescribed for your chronic condition.

Transportation

If you don't own a car and you don't live close to your doctors and specialists, transportation can be a major barrier to good health. Relying on friends and family to transport you to appointments can be unreliable if your appointment times don't fit into their schedules, and the costs of paying for a cab can add up quickly. Medicare Advantage plans can help you access regular medical care by giving you free transportation to your medical appointments, ensuring that you won't miss them.

Home Cleaning and Indoor Air Purification

Respiratory conditions like severe asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder can become much worse if the air quality in your home is poor, and an asthma or COPD flareup can require emergency care. In order to reduce the likelihood of hospital admission, some Medicare Advantage plans offer free home cleaning services and indoor air purifying machines that can improve the air quality in your home. Removing pollutants like dust and animal dander from your home helps you breathe easier by keeping them out of the air.

Ultimately, these additional benefits that you won't find in traditional Medicare are designed to address non-medical factors that may affect your health. By providing you with these benefits, insurance companies can reduce their own costs by keeping you healthier. If you have a chronic health condition, it's a good idea to look for a Medicare Advantage plan that will provide you with numerous non-medical benefits — it can save you money by reducing the amount you personally spend on food and transportation while helping you improve your health.

For more information on Medicare Advantage plans, contact a professional near you.