Letter: Medicare Counselors at Lapham Assisted 363 New Canaan Residents

To the Editor,

Volunteer Medicare counselors at Lapham Center just finished our sixteenth year of assisting residents in evaluating their Medicare Part D Prescription Drug plans. This year, like everything else in 2020, our counselors had to change all their procedures in order to work safely so nearly all appointments were done over the phone.

Despite many challenges, during the seven week Open Enrollment period that began October 15, our counselors were able to “meet” with 363 New Canaan residents. Over 50% people found a less expensive drug plan saving, as a group, $315,398.89.

In the ten years that we have kept records on savings, our counselors have saved residents a total of $2,155.378.

We would like to thank our volunteer Medicare counselors who provide this very valuable and free service:  Dick Neville, Harvey Place, Sally Campbell and Kim Campbell and Shean-Mei Sheu. Together they put in hundreds of hours helping their neighbors with what can be a very confusing process.

Lapham Center is also fortunate to have volunteer Medicare counselors available year round to answer questions about Medicare and help those who are new to Medicare navigate the enrollment process. Appointments are available at 203-594-3620.

Medicare counseling may be the single most important service we provide. It would not be possible without these dedicated volunteers who go through extensive training and then spend many hours running the computer programs and explaining their findings to the Medicare recipients. We are so very grateful for all their efforts!

Aggie Aspinwall, Director
Lapham Community Center
Senior Center of New Canaan, Inc.