Medicare Advantage

Your San Diego Medicare checklist: what to review before the Dec. 7 deadline

People in San Diego can choose from 85 Medicare Advantage plans for 2027, against 93 this year. 26 of this year’s plans are gone, 18 are new to San Diego County, and 48 that continue have changed their premium, deductible, plan type or name, 20 of them under a new name.

SAN DIEGO — The Annual Enrollment Period for 2027 Medicare coverage is open now and runs through Dec. 7, 2026. Any change you make in that window takes effect Jan. 1, 2027. If you do nothing, your current Medicare Advantage or Part D plan simply renews for next year, with whatever updates the insurer spelled out in its Annual Notice of Change — which is exactly why it's worth a careful read this fall.

This checklist is built for San Diego residents who want to walk into Dec. 7 confident they looked at the right things, in the right order.

Start with the Annual Notice of Change

Your plan was required to send an Annual Notice of Change (ANOC) by late September. It is the single most useful document you own this fall. It compares what your plan does in 2026 to what it will do in 2027 — the monthly premium, the deductible, the copays for primary care and specialists, the drug tier structure, the maximum out-of-pocket, and any changes to extra benefits like dental, vision, hearing or over-the-counter cards.

Read it with a highlighter. If anything that matters to you is moving in the wrong direction, that is your cue to compare.

The companion document, the Evidence of Coverage (EOC), is the long version — the full rulebook for 2027. You don't need to read it cover to cover, but it's where to go when the ANOC raises a question.

Check your doctors and hospitals for 2027

Networks change every year. A doctor who is in your plan in 2026 may not be in 2027, and vice versa. Before you decide to stay, confirm each of these on next year's plan:

• Your primary care doctor
• Any specialist you see regularly
• The hospital system you'd want to use (Scripps, Sharp, UC San Diego Health, Kaiser Permanente, Palomar Health, Rady Children's for a grandchild on your plan, etc.)
• Any skilled nursing, home health or dialysis provider you rely on

The fastest check: call your doctor's billing office and ask, by name, which 2027 Medicare Advantage plans they will accept. Then confirm on the plan's own 2027 provider directory. Do both — directories go stale.

Check your prescriptions against the 2027 formulary

Drug lists (formularies) also reset every Jan. 1. A medication can move to a higher tier, require prior authorization, or come off the list entirely.

Make a list of every prescription you take — name, dose, how often. Then run it through the Medicare Plan Finder at medicare.gov/plan-compare. It will show you, for each plan available in your ZIP code, the full-year cost of your specific drugs at the pharmacies you use.

A few 2027 numbers worth knowing as you compare Part D coverage:

• The Part D out-of-pocket cap rises to $2,400 in 2027 (up from $2,100 in 2026).
• The Part D maximum deductible rises to $700 in 2027 (up from $615 in 2026).
• The Medicare Prescription Payment Plan is still available if you'd rather spread drug costs across monthly bills instead of paying a big amount at the pharmacy counter.

Know what's on the menu in San Diego County

San Diego is in San Diego County, where CMS's 2026 landscape file lists 93 Medicare Advantage plans from 17 carriers — 68 HMOs, 16 HMO-POS and 9 PPOs, with 33 Special Needs Plans among them. Every plan on the county list includes drug coverage.

The 17 carriers offering plans in the county are Aetna (CVS Health), Alignment Health Plan, Astiva Health, Blue Shield of California, Centene (WellCare), Central Health Medicare Plan, Champion Health Plan, Clever Care Health Plan, Community Health Group, Elevance Health (Anthem), Humana, Imperial Health Plan of California, Kaiser Permanente, Molina Healthcare of California, SCAN Health Plan, Sharp Health Plan and UnitedHealthcare. The table below lists every plan by carrier.

The 2027 lineup — plan names, availability and benefits — is what you'll see on medicare.gov once you enter your ZIP code.

A few 2027 figures CMS has not yet announced

Two numbers people always ask about this time of year — the 2027 Part B standard premium and deductible, and the 2027 IRMAA income brackets and surcharges for higher earners — are not out yet. CMS typically announces them in the fall, usually November. Don't let anyone project them for you; wait for the official figure.

For reference, IRMAA surcharges in 2026 begin above $109,000 in income for a single filer.

The Dec. 7 checklist, in order

1. Read your plan's ANOC. Mark anything that changed. 2. Confirm your doctors and hospital system are in the plan's 2027 network. 3. Run your drug list through Plan Finder at medicare.gov. 4. If everything still fits, you don't have to do anything — your plan renews automatically. 5. If something no longer fits, use medicare.gov or call 1‑800‑MEDICARE (TTY 1‑877‑486‑2048), open 24/7, to compare and enroll by Dec. 7.

One safety net to remember: if you're on a Medicare Advantage plan and change your mind after Jan. 1, the Medicare Advantage Open Enrollment Period (Jan. 1 – March 31, 2027) lets you switch to another Advantage plan or go back to Original Medicare once.