“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” – Benjamin Franklin

Preventive Care is  the single most effective way to maintain health and wellness and that is why Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina is committed to providing customers with preventive health care options that are covered at 100% on every health plan available, including Blue Advantage, Blue Value and Blue Select, and Blue Local.

A leader in the industry for preventive care, Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina was the first health insurer in the nation to cover physician office visits and diagnostic tests and to treat obesity as a primary condition.  They led the way in offering co-payment waivers for generic drugs, providing free nutritionist visits and rewarding North Carolina residents for routine physical activity.  Preventive Care includes all medical services related to the prevention of disease, provided by or upon the direction of a doctor or other provider and includes routine physical checkups, mammograms, colonoscopies and many other wellness exams, as expressed in the preventive care guidelines.  For a complete list of preventive care services click here.  Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina understands the power of prevention and they are pleased to provide customers with the coverage you need to stay well.

For more information on Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina insurance coverage, please visit our website at www.nchealthplans.com or call our toll free number 888-765-5400 and speak with one of our experienced and professional agents.

Kara Withee has recently joined Jerry Ballard and Associates as a Customer Service Representative and Sales Associate for Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC).  With over twelve years of customer service experience, Kara is a graduate of the University of Texas, El Paso with a Bachelor of Arts in English and American Literature and a Master of Arts degree in Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies from San Diego State University.

Prior to joining our agency, Kara taught high school English and Elementary Spanish in both the public and private school sectors.  She relocated to Morehead City, NC in support of her husband’s military career and now resides there with her three sons, her daughter, a Golden Retriever and a house cat.  In her spare time, Kara enjoys reading, paddle boarding and spending time with her children.  For all your Blue Advantage, Blue Value, Blue Select and Dental Blue needs, Kara brings both personable and professional assistance to the health care industry and the residents of North Carolina and she is pleased to offer her service expertise to help you navigate through the Marketplace to determine subsidy eligibility and to guide you in choosing the best Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina plans for you and your family.

For more information on health insurance coverage in North Carolina, please visit our website at www.nchealthplans.com or call our toll free number 888-765-5400 and speak with one of our professional agents. Our agency provides coverage for health insurance in North Carolina through Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC). It would be our pleasure to help you navigate through the Health Care Reform changes in accordance with the new regulations of Obama care. Call us for details.

Kristen Baily has recently joined Jerry Ballard & Associates as a Customer Service & Sales Representative.  She is a graduate of North Carolina State University with a Bachelor of Science in Business Management and a concentration in Human Resource Management. Kristen is joining our team with over 7 years of sales and customer service experience in the home building and real estate industry.

A native of Eastern North Carolina, Kristen enjoys living on the coast and boating with her family and friends in her spare time. She and her husband reside in Beaufort with their two dogs.

Kristen is thrilled to implement her experience in customer service and sales in the insurance world and she is looking forward to providing residents of North Carolina with the knowledge and guidance needed to select the Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC products that meet your health insurance needs and assist you in navigating through the Marketplace to determine subsidy eligibility.

For more information on health insurance coverage in North Carolina, please visit our website at www.nchealthplans.com or call our toll free number 888-765-5400 and speak with one of our professional agents. Our agency provides coverage for health insurance in North Carolina through Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC). It would be our pleasure to help you navigate through the Health Care Reform changes in accordance with the new regulations of Obama care. Call us for details.

Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina offers Dental Blue for individuals and families to optimize your health.

• Visit any licensed dentist you choose within the network
• No additional cost to you for two annual cleanings, diagnostic or preventive services
• No waiting period for preventive care
• Coverage for fillings, gum treatments, extractions, crowns and more

Protect your overall health

Medical experts have linked periodontal (gum) disease to stroke, heart disease, diabetes, pre-term or low-birth weight babies and other health issues. Nearly 75 percent of American adults have some form of periodontal disease, but with proper daily dental care, regular dental checkups can help detect, prevent and treat gum disease and related disorders. Choose Dental Blue for Individuals and you can take a big step toward protecting your overall health. Click here to get your Dental Blue quote.

Coverage you can smile about

With Dental Blue for Individuals, you’re covered for a broad range of dental services, including routine fillings and extractions, plus major services like crowns, bridges and dentures. Coverage also includes preventive care. That means you can get checkups and cleanings twice per benefit period, and that translates into good oral health. And there are no waiting periods for cleanings, routine oral exams and other diagnostic and preventive services.

For more information on health insurance coverage in North Carolina, please visit our website at www.nchealthplans.com or call our toll free number 888-765-5400 and speak with one of our professional agents. Our agency provides coverage for health insurance in North Carolina through Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC). It would be our pleasure to help you navigate through the Health Care Reform changes in accordance with the new regulations of Obama care. Call us for details.

Wake Forest University has received a $3 million gift from Blue Cross Blue Shield to help the school promote well-being at the university, Wake Forest officials said.

The money will go to develop projects designed to promote what is being called a holistic approach to health that spans eight dimensions of well-being: physical, emotional, spiritual, social, intellectual, financial, occupational and environmental.

 “Our approach to well-being is intentional and a natural extension of our mission to educate the whole person,” said Wake Forest University President Nathan O. Hatch, in a statement. “Well-being is not the absence of illness and stress, but the presence of healthy habits, purpose and joyful relationships. We are grateful to Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina for its transformative gift to enhance well-being on our campus and across the state.”

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$50… from Blue Cross Blue Shield to you!  Current members that are enrolled in individual BCBSNC health insurance plans can take a 15-minute personalized, confidential health assessment right now, and BCBSNC will send you a $50 gift card.  It’s that simple!  Even if you earned $50 last year, you can earn it again.  Then complete a wellness program designed around your needs and earn points to qualify for another $50 gift card.  This is a limited-time offer! Act now by visiting My Members Services- Healthy Outcomes.

Members must be 18 years of age or older to participate.  Health Assessment must be completed within the first 150 days of your plan’s 2014 effective date.  After completing the Health Assessment, you will receive your $50 gift card reward within 5-9 weeks.  You must complete the wellness program components between Jan 1 2014 and Sept 30 2014 and earn at least 120 points in the program to qualify.

Remember if you have an individual health insurance plan with Blue Cross Blue Shield, ACT TODAY!

For more information on health insurance coverage in North Carolina, please visit our website at www.nchealthplans.com or call our toll free number 888-765-5400 and speak with one of our professional agents. Our agency provides coverage for health insurance in North Carolina through Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC). It would be our pleasure to help you navigate through the Health Care Reform changes in accordance with the new regulations of Obama care. Call us for details.

Posted April 14, 2014 – Blue Cross Blue Shield- Health Care Reform Blog

By: James LaCorte

Where does my health insurance premium really go? Health insurance customers often ask a simple question about the premium they pay every month:

Where does my premium dollar go? They’re usually not asking for a quick tutorial on how insurance works: Most people understand that everyone pays into a pool, and only those who need medical care take money out in the form of health care claims. What many of these folks really are asking is how much of that money actually pays for health care and how much goes toward running an insurance company — or toward profits.  Fair question.  Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC) paid $5 billion in claims in 2013. Recently we announced that we spent almost 86 cents of every premium dollar paying for our customers’ health care – doctor visits, surgery, tests, medicine, eyeglasses, etc.

Our non-medical spending largely goes toward customer service and technology. We are also a full-taxed company. In 2013, we paid out more than $100 million in local, state and federal taxes.

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Open enrollment for health insurance has ended; however you may still qualify for a special enrollment period due to a qualifying event.  Some examples of these qualifying events include:

1. Marriage, having a baby, adopting a child or placing a child for adoption or foster care, moving outside your insurer’s coverage area, gaining citizenship, leaving incarceration.
2. Gaining status as member of an Indian tribe. Members of federally recognized Indian tribes can sign up for or change plans once per month throughout the year.
3. For people already enrolled in Marketplace coverage: Having a change in income or household status that affects eligibility for premium tax credits or cost-sharing reductions
4.  Losing other health coverage—due to losing job-based coverage, divorce, the end of an individual policy plan year in 2014, COBRA expiration, aging off a parent’s plan, losing eligibility for Medicaid or CHIP, and similar circumstances. Important: Voluntarily ending coverage doesn’t qualify you for a special enrollment period. Neither does losing coverage that doesn’t qualify as minimum essential coverage.

For more information on health insurance coverage in North Carolina, please visit our website at www.nchealthplans.com or call our toll free number 888-765-5400 and speak with one of our professional agents. Our agency provides coverage for health insurance in North Carolina through Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC). It would be our pleasure to help you navigate through the Health Care Reform changes in accordance with the new regulations of Obama care. Call us for details.

BCBSNC wants to help you save. Consider one of our new low cost plan options.  To help lessen the financial impacts of health care reform, BCBSNC has created several new plan options for 2014.

Blue Select is one of those plan options that provides smart choices and health savings.

Blue Select features a tiered network to help you save money. This plan offers:
+ A large network with two tiers of providers to choose from
+ Prescription drug requirements

For more information on health insurance coverage in North Carolina, please visit our website at www.nchealthplans.com or call our toll free number 888-765-5400 and speak with one of our professional agents. Our agency provides coverage for health insurance in North Carolina through Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC). It would be our pleasure to help you navigate through the Health Care Reform changes in accordance with the new regulations of Obama care. Call us for details.

Information from a BCBSNC publication on 8/12/13.

01 Aug 2013- BCBSNC Media Center

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC) announced today that it will host the 2013 dotBlue conference. The annual symposium focuses on using the latest digital and web strategies to address the health insurance industry’s most pressing challenges. This year’s conference, titled Connecting the Dots, will focus on helping consumers understand and navigate health care reform.

The conference will take place at BCBSNC’s Durham campus from Oct. 23-25, 2013. Conference attendance is limited to Blue Cross Blue Shield Plan professionals.

Participating Blue Plans will be invited to present on relevant topics of their choice. In addition, attendees will participate in presentations about using the latest in web design and digital technology to address the changes coming to health insurance in 2014, including:

• Pursuit of the Virtuous Quantified Life
  • Presented by Robert D. Furberg, senior clinical informaticist at RTI International’s Center for the Advancement of Health Information Technology (more…)

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – From July 2011 to June 2012, Wake County officials documented more than 2,000 incidents of child abuse or neglect. As a step to help end this problem, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC) will provide the SAFEchild Advocacy Center with an investment to help provide comprehensive medical evaluations to children who have been physically or sexually abused. SAFEchild is a nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating child abuse in Wake County.

“By supporting the SAFEchild Advocacy Center, we’re investing in North Carolina’s most important resource, our children,” said Kathy Higgins, BCBSNC vice president of corporate affairs. “The fantastic team at the Advocacy Center goes above and beyond to create a healing environment, and each staff member plays an important role in the health of our kids and our community.”

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If you applied in the past for Blue Cross Blue Shield Individual insurance or through another carrier and were declined due to medical ineligibility, we wanted to make you aware of new 2014 underwriting regulations through the Affordable Health Care Act, also known as Obamacare.  Under these new regulations, applicants who apply for coverage with a January 1^st or later effective date will no longer be underwritten with regards to their health or pre-existing conditions and therefore will be guaranteed issued with no rate increase for health conditions. The law also requires insurance companies to cover all applicants within new minimum standards and offer the same rates regardless of pre-existing conditions or gender.  Beginning October 1^st, we will be enrolling new customers into Blue Cross Blue Shield plans for 2014 effective dates.  Please give us a call or go online to generate your free rate quote on or after October 1^st and secure your Blue Cross coverage for 2014. If you would like to get your free rate quote and/or apply on line for Blue Cross Blue Shield coverage, please CLICK HERE and complete the information to generate your quote.

For more information on health insurance coverage in North Carolina, please visit our website at www.nchealthplans.com or call our toll free number 888-765-5400 and speak with one of our professional agents. Our agency provides coverage for health insurance in North Carolina through Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC). Call us for details.