By Hayley Wielgus
TYLER, TX (KYTX) - Medical identity theft: it happens to senior citizens all the time but many are scared to talk about it.
"Some of them are so embarrassed that they won't tell anyone about it," said Charlotte Parks of the Better Business Bureau of Central East Texas. "They call me at home and tell me about it."
Parks is a senior advisor and advocate for the BBB. She said identity thieves steal senior citizens' Medicare policy numbers to order medical equipment or have procedures done in their names.
"If you've been scammed, you start getting bills from Medicare that you bought some type of breathing machine and you've never done that," Parks said.
If you're a Medicare recipient, keeping your Social Security number safe is the best way to protect your medical identity. That's because your Social Security number is also your Medicare number. If you have private insurance, protect that policy number, too.
"When you get any calls you don't recognize on the telephone, the main thing is don't give out your information, that's the bottom line," Parks said.
If you do have your medical identity stolen, Mechele Mills with the BBB said check your credit report and medical records for fraud, then file a police report.
"Take that police report and send it to your health insurance company or Medicare," Mills said. "You want to send it to the three credit bureaus as well, so they can put a fraud alert on your credit report."
On average, it costs $20,000 dollars to resolve a case of medical identity fraud. Suzi Stein with Threlkeld & Co. Insurance said adding an identity theft protection policy to your homeowner's or renter's insurance can help cover that. It only costs about $25 a year. Stein said the policy often sets you up with an advocate.
"To be able to pick up the phone and have somebody right there who is going to say, 'I know what you're feeling, this is awful but there is an end and we're gonna have to work our way through it,'" Stein said.
