She had Part A Medicare, no Part B, and supplemental health insurance through G.E.H.A. (my Dad was a retired mail carrier).

'Way back when my folks turned 65 in CA, they had Kaiser Insurance. It was a GREAT deal with low premiums - all Dr. visits cost them $5 and all prescriptions cost $3. It's not that way anymore, of course. Because they had such good insurance at the time, they didn't get Part B Medicare.

But things changed. When you turn 65, be sure and get on Part B. When my Mom went into a nursing home at age 92 she needed it - and the only way to get her on it would have been to pay 27 years of retroactive monthly premiums. That's not a good option.

My folks didn't anticipate that medical costs and premiums would go up so much, of course - and neither did I. When I retired, our health insurance premiums had always been a couple of hundred bucks a month, no big deal. I figured they'd go up some as we got older, but I didn't know they'd go up 500% or 600% - and I think that's putting a lot of folks in a bind.