Consumers can now use an experimental feature on healthcare.gov to look up whether their doctor is included in an Obamacare plan.
Healthcare.gov, which residents in 38 states use to sign up for Obamacare, is piloting a beta version of the new feature, the administration announced Tuesday. The tool is only for healthcare.gov and not for the state-based exchanges.
Not everyone will be able to use the feature right out the gate, as only one in four visitors to healthcare.gov will have access to it. The reason is that the feature is still being tested.
The consumers will be selected at random to participate, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which oversees healthcare.gov.
“The doctor lookup feature at healthcare.gov is a direct result of consumer demand,” said Kevin Counihan, CEO of the Health Insurance Marketplace. “Our goal is to provide consumers with relevant, personal and more up-to-date information about a plan before enrolling.”
A consumer previously could look for his or her doctor, but would have to go through the website of the insurer of the plan he selected. Now that information will be available in a search feature on healthcare.gov.
As of Tuesday, healthcare.gov has access to data from more than 90 percent of insurance companies on the marketplace, CMS said.
“If an insurance company has not provided validated data, consumers will be alerted when they search for a provider that there is ‘no data from insurance company,'” according to the agency.
The agency added that health plans can change doctors in their networks on a continual basis, so consumers need to check with their doctor or plan to confirm that the doctor accepts that plan.
The doctor lookup was touted by CMS as a new tool for helping consumers navigate healthcare.gov. Another tool is an out-of-pocket cost calculator, which is available to everyone on healthcare.gov, that allows consumers to see how much they will have to pay out of pocket for a certain plan.
The agency is still working on a pilot for a similar lookup tool for prescription drugs, where consumers can search to see whether a plan covers the drugs they take.
A pilot on the prescription drug lookup tool will be ready in the coming weeks, the agency said.
