Does Social Security Disability Come With Medical Coverage?

If you are disabled and you worked before you developed your disability, you are likely eligible to enroll in the Social Security Disability program and receive monthly benefits. These benefits are cash benefits paid to eligible individuals to help them pay for living expenses. Although these benefits do not include medical insurance, you might also qualify to receive Medicare.

Disability and Medicare Insurance

• Social Security Disability is a program that pays disability benefits to eligible individuals. These benefits are funded by the Social Security taxes you paid while you were employed. These benefits are designed to help disability recipients with their basic needs. If you are eligible to receive these benefits, you receive a monthly check that you can use to pay monthly expenses. Although you can use your benefits to pay for doctor appointments and medical costs, these benefits do not constitute health or medical insurance. You must pay for your own medical insurance coverage until you are eligible to receive Medicare.

Disability and Medicare

• Although your disability benefits do not include medical coverage, you are eligible to receive Medicare benefits if you continue receiving disability. Medicare coverage automatically starts after you receive disability benefits for two full years. You are enrolled in Medicare Part A, hospital insurance, and Part B, medical insurance in the beginning of the third month in which you receive disability benefits. However, although you do not need to pay for Part A coverage, you do need to pay for Part B coverage if you want to keep it.

Disability Eligibility

• To be eligible to receive Medicare benefits, you must first be eligible to receive Social Security Disability benefits, and you must be eligible to keep these benefits for two years. One requirement for eligibility is that your disability must last for at least one year or lead to death. Also, your disability must make it difficult for you to work. As of 2011, if you do work, you cannot earn more than $1,000 per month. You are also required to have paid Social Security tax. Older people are required to have paid these taxes for at least 10 years, and younger people are required to have paid according to their age when they became disabled.

Considerations

• At any point while you are receiving benefits, if the Social Security office finds that you no longer meet the requirements for the program, it will suspend your benefits. If this happens before the end of your second year of receiving benefits, you must wait until you are 65 years of age before you receive Medicare benefits, as most people do.