Medicare Advantage

New Orleans Medicare Advantage 2027: the nine carriers and what each one sells

Orleans Parish has 67 Medicare Advantage plans for 2027. Compared with 2026, 10 plans are not coming back, 12 are new, and 28 continuing plans changed in some way you should check before December 7, 11 of them under a new name. This guide covers what those numbers mean for New Orleans, not which plan to pick.

Medicare AdvantageNew Orleans, LA

If you live in New Orleans and you are shopping Medicare Advantage for 2027, the first useful thing to know is who is actually selling plans here — and what kind of plans they are. New Orleans sits inside Orleans Parish, and Medicare plan availability is set at the parish level. For 2027, CMS lists 56 Medicare Advantage plans in Orleans Parish, offered by nine carriers. Every one of those 56 plans includes Part D prescription drug coverage.

The full lineup is in the table below. This article walks through it carrier by carrier so you can see, at a glance, who offers HMOs, who offers PPOs, and who offers Special Needs Plans in the New Orleans area.

What "available in New Orleans" really means

Medicare uses your county — in Louisiana, your parish — to decide which plans you can join. Because New Orleans is in Orleans Parish, the plans below are the ones a New Orleans resident can pick from for 2027. Someone across the parish line may see a different list.

The roster comes from the CMS Medicare Advantage Landscape Source File for plan year 2027. It tells you what is offered. It does not tell you what any given plan costs you, what doctors are in network, or how it handles a specific drug. Those details live in each plan's own documents and on the Medicare Plan Finder at medicare.gov.

The eight carriers offering MA-PD plans in Orleans Parish

Here is the carrier-by-carrier view, in alphabetical order, matching the full table below.

• Aetna (CVS Health) — 13 plans, offered as HMO and PPO, including 5 Special Needs Plans. Aetna's New Orleans lineup includes plan names such as Aetna Medicare Signature Care, Aetna Medicare Value Care, Aetna Medicare Eagle Plus Giveback, and several Dual Care and Chronic Care SNPs.
• American Health Advantage of Louisiana — 1 plan, an HMO Institutional Special Needs Plan (I-SNP) aimed at people who live in or need a nursing-home level of care.
• Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana — 7 plans under the Blue adVantage name, offered as HMO-POS and PPO, including 1 Special Needs Plan (Blue adVantage Dual Plus).
• Centene (WellCare) — 7 plans, all HMO-POS, including 3 Dual-eligible Special Needs Plans (Wellcare Dual Access, Wellcare Dual Liberty, Wellcare Dual Reserve).
• Devoted Health — 6 plans, all PPO, including 4 Special Needs Plans (two Chronic Condition SNPs and two Dual SNPs).
• Elevance Health (Anthem) — 3 plans, all HMO Dual Special Needs Plans, marketed locally under the Healthy Blue name.
• Humana — 16 plans, offered as HMO and PPO. This is the largest single-carrier count in the parish and includes 6 Special Needs Plans, plus regional PPO options and co-branded plans such as Humana LCMC Advantage and Humana USAA Honor Giveback.
• UnitedHealthcare — 12 plans, offered as HMO-POS and PPO, including 7 Special Needs Plans. That set includes three UHC Dual Complete plans built for people who have both Medicare and Medicaid.

You will notice that Special Needs Plans (SNPs) make up nearly half the local lineup — 30 of 65. That reflects how many carriers in Louisiana are building plans specifically for dual-eligible members (people on Medicare and Medicaid), and for members with certain chronic conditions.

How to read the plan types

The table shows three plan types in New Orleans for 2027:

• HMO — you generally use the plan's network of doctors and hospitals, and you usually need a referral to see a specialist.
• HMO-POS — an HMO with a "point of service" option that lets you go outside the network for some services, usually at a higher cost.
• PPO — you can see out-of-network providers who accept the plan, usually at a higher cost, and you generally do not need referrals.

Some plans also carry a tag like D-SNP, C-SNP or I-SNP. Those are Special Needs Plans, and they have eligibility rules:

• D-SNP — for people with both Medicare and Medicaid.
• C-SNP — for people with certain chronic conditions, such as diabetes or heart conditions.
• I-SNP — for people who need an institutional level of care.

If a plan in the table has one of those tags, you can only join it if you meet that group's eligibility rules.

Drug coverage: it is baked in here

Every one of the 56 Medicare Advantage plans available in Orleans Parish for 2027 includes Part D drug coverage. CMS also lists 0 stand-alone Part D plans in the parish for 2027, which means if you want prescription coverage through a Medicare Advantage plan sold here, it comes bundled inside the plan itself.

A few program-level Part D facts worth knowing for 2027:

• The Part D out-of-pocket cap is $2,100 in 2026 ($2,400 in 2027). Once your covered drug spending hits that, you pay $0 for covered drugs for the rest of the year.
• The Part D deductible is capped at $615, though many plans set a lower deductible.
• The old "donut hole" is gone as of 2025. Part D now has three phases: deductible, initial coverage, and catastrophic.
• The Medicare Prescription Payment Plan lets you spread your drug costs across the calendar year in monthly amounts instead of paying at the pharmacy counter. It is optional.

Dates to keep in mind

• Annual Enrollment Period: October 15 – December 7. This is when most people join, switch, or drop a Medicare Advantage or Part D plan for the next year.
• Medicare Advantage Open Enrollment: January 1 – March 31. If you are already in a Medicare Advantage plan on Jan. 1, you get one chance during this window to switch to a different MA plan or return to Original Medicare.

If your income was above $109,000 as a single filer in the relevant tax year, you may also owe an IRMAA surcharge on Part B and Part D in 2026. That is a Medicare rule, not a plan rule — it applies whether you pick an MA plan or stay with Original Medicare.

How to actually decide

The table below lists every Medicare Advantage plan available in Orleans Parish for 2027, by carrier, with its plan type and drug-coverage status. That is the starting point, not the finish line.

From there, a good process looks like this:

1. Write down your doctors, your hospital, and your regular prescriptions. 2. Go to medicare.gov/plan-compare and enter your ZIP code and drug list. The Plan Finder will match plans to your prescriptions and show what each one would cost you. 3. Check each plan's provider network directly with the plan or your doctor's office. 4. If you qualify for a Special Needs Plan, look at those first — they are built for your situation. 5. Call your local SHIP (State Health Insurance Assistance Program) for free, unbiased help. In Louisiana, SHIIP is the state's counseling program for people on Medicare.