Newsroom · Utah
Does University of Utah Health Accept Medicare Advantage?
Some plans, some years. The useful question isn't whether — it's how you find out for your plan, and how often you have to ask again.
The bottom line
- There is no single answer, and anyone who gives you one is guessing. Network status is a contract between one insurer and one health system, renegotiated on its own schedule — Medicare.gov says outright that plans can change the providers in the network at any time during the year.
- Two documented events show how fast it moves: Select Health added U of U Health facilities and providers to its Medicare Advantage network effective July 1, 2022; U of U Health Plans discontinued its own Advantage U Medicare Advantage plans effective January 1, 2024.
- Ask about the doctor, not the building. The hospital, Huntsman Cancer Institute, Moran Eye Center and the health centers are separate facilities, and the physicians in them can be contracted separately.
- Availability comes before network. Salt Lake County has 24 MA-PD plans from 7 carriers for 2026; Grand County has 8 from 2. A plan can't cover your U of U specialist if it isn't sold where you live.
- The version with no network exists: Original Medicare plus a Medicare Supplement has no in-network list to check — any provider in the country who accepts Medicare.
This is one of the most-typed Medicare questions in Utah, and it has a frustrating answer: it depends, and it depends on things that change. I'd rather tell you that than hand you a tidy carrier list that goes stale in March. So here is what's actually documented, why the question resists a permanent answer, and the four checks that give you one you can rely on for the year you're asking about.
Why "does the U take my plan" isn't a fact about the U
A hospital doesn't accept or refuse Medicare Advantage as a category. Each Medicare Advantage plan is sold by a private insurer, and that insurer signs a separate contract with each health system, each facility, and often each physician group. Some of those contracts run a year, some run several, and they get renegotiated on schedules nobody publishes in advance.
Medicare.gov's description of how Advantage plans work is unusually direct about the consequence: in most cases you have to use doctors and other providers in the plan's network, and plans can change the providers in the network at any time during the year. Not at renewal. During the year.
That single sentence is why every "which plans cover X hospital" list you'll find — including any I could write — is a photograph of something that moves. It's still worth knowing what's documented, because the documented history tells you how much this particular question moves.
What's actually on the record
Two dated events, both verifiable, both about Medicare Advantage specifically:
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| July 1, 2022 Added | Select Health adds University of Utah Health facilities and providers to its Medicare Advantage network — University of Utah Hospital, Huntsman Cancer Institute, Moran Eye Center, University Orthopaedic Center, and the South Jordan, Sugar House and Farmington health centers. Announced May 5, 2022. |
| January 1, 2024 Ended | University of Utah Health Plans discontinues its OWN Medicare Advantage plans — Advantage U Signature (PPO), Advantage U Signature Buyback (PPO), and Advantage U for University of Utah Retirees (PPO). Members are told they will need to obtain coverage from another Medicare plan for 2024 and beyond. |
Sources: Select Health — Addition of University of Utah Facilities and Providers to its Medicare Advantage Network (May 5, 2022) · University of Utah Health Plans — Advantage U Medicare Advantage: Plans No Longer Offered.
Read those two rows together and the lesson isn't about any one insurer. It's that in roughly eighteen months, the Medicare Advantage picture around one academic medical center changed twice — once by an outside carrier adding the system, once by the system's own insurance arm leaving the Advantage business entirely. Neither change announced itself to the people it affected in a way most of them noticed at the time.
University of Utah Health also maintains its own accepted-insurance page and a standing Select Health update page. The fact that a health system keeps a permanent public page about one payer relationship should tell you something about how settled these arrangements are. Those pages, not this one, are the authority on the current list — and I'd read them alongside your plan's directory rather than instead of it.
The four checks that actually settle it
This takes about twenty minutes and it is the difference between believing you're covered and knowing it:
| Check | What you do | When |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Check the entity, not the brand | "University of Utah Health" is a system, not a single contract. The hospital, Huntsman Cancer Institute, the Moran Eye Center, the University Orthopaedic Center and the community health centers are distinct facilities, and the physicians practicing in them can be contracted separately. Ask about the exact place and the exact doctor. | Do first |
| 2. Search the plan's own directory by physician name | Not the system name, not the hospital. Each doctor, individually, in the directory for the plan year you're asking about — networks are set contract year by contract year, so a 2026 lookup doesn't answer a 2027 question. | Do first |
| 3. Get it confirmed twice, and written down | Call the plan's member services line and the clinic's billing office and ask the same question of both. Note the date, the name, and the reference number. Directories are known to lag the contracts they describe. | Do second |
| 4. Re-verify every fall | Your Annual Notice of Change letter arrives by September 30 and flags network changes for the coming year — but it won't name your doctor. Redo checks 2 and 3 during the October 15 – December 7 enrollment window, every year. | Every year |
Check one is where most people go wrong, so it's worth slowing down on. "University of Utah Health" is a name that covers a lot of separate buildings and a lot of separate billing entities — University of Utah Hospital, Huntsman Cancer Institute, the Moran Eye Center, the University Orthopaedic Center, and community health centers scattered from Farmington to South Jordan. A plan can contract with the hospital and not with a particular physician group practicing inside it. When you call, name the doctor and name the location. "Is the U in network?" is a question that can be answered yes and still leave you with a bill.
We walk through the same verification in more detail, for every major Utah hospital system, in our hospital-network test for Utah plans.
Availability first, network second
Before the network question means anything, a plan has to be sold in your county. For 2026, the CMS landscape file shows this across the counties whose residents most often use U of U Health, plus Grand County for contrast:
| County | MA-PD plans | At $0 plan premium | Carriers |
|---|---|---|---|
| Salt Lake — SLC | 24 | 17 | 7 |
| Davis | 24 | 17 | 7 |
| Utah | 21 | 14 | 6 |
| Weber | 19 | 13 | 6 |
| Summit | 16 | 10 | 6 |
| Tooele | 15 | 10 | 6 |
| Grand — Moab | 8 | 5 | 2 |
Source: CMS CY2026 Medicare Advantage / Part D Landscape, MA-PD offerings by county (accessed July 2026); 280 offerings across 28 Utah counties. Confirm your own ZIP on medicare.gov/plan-compare.
The gap between the top and bottom rows is the part that catches people out here in southeast Utah. Salt Lake County residents choose among 24 plans from 7 carriers. In Grand County the menu is 8 plans from 2. If you live in Moab or Monticello and your oncologist, your surgeon or your eye specialist is at the U — which is common, because that's where rural Utah gets referred for specialty care — you are asking the network question with a much shorter list of plans to ask it about. Sometimes the answer is that no plan available in your county contracts the way you need. That's worth finding out in October rather than in the surgical scheduler's office.
The out-of-pocket maximum is the other half of the network question
People treat "in network" as a yes/no and stop there, but on a PPO the real question is what out-of-network costs, and on any Advantage plan it's what the ceiling is when a year goes badly. Salt Lake County's in-network out-of-pocket maximums for 2026 run from $3,500 to $9,250 — a $5,750 spread — and PPO plans carry a separate, higher combined limit for out-of-network care.
Which means two plans that both "cover the U" can still be a five-figure difference apart in the year you need the U most. The network answer gets you onto the short list. The out-of-pocket maximum decides which one on the short list you want.
One thing that is not in doubt: emergencies are covered regardless of network. Medicare Advantage plans must cover emergency and urgently needed care without regard to whether the hospital is in the plan's network. Never hesitate at an emergency room door over this question. The exposure comes afterward — the follow-up appointment, the specialist referral, the scheduled procedure.
The version of this question with no network at all
Worth stating plainly, because the whole article assumes the answer has to be a plan: Original Medicare with a Medicare Supplement (Medigap) and a stand-alone Part D plan has no network. You can see any provider in the country who accepts Medicare — University of Utah Health included, along with Intermountain, the Mayo Clinic, or a clinic in Arizona in February. There's no directory to re-check every fall and no contract renegotiation that can quietly move your surgeon out of reach.
The trade is honest. You pay a real monthly supplement premium on top of the $202.90 Part B premium, plus a separate drug plan, and Original Medicare's $283 annual deductible and 20% coinsurance are what the supplement exists to absorb. And there's a clock: your one-time 6-month Medigap open enrollment period starts when you're 65 and enrolled in Part B, and that's generally the one stretch when a company must sell you a policy without health questions. Utah adds a narrow annual window on top of that — our guide to Utah's Medigap birthday rule covers exactly what it does and doesn't allow.
For someone whose care already runs through one specific academic medical center, that's often the calculation worth doing first. Our side-by-side on Medigap versus Advantage lays out the whole fork.
What I'd do if my specialist were at the U
- Write down the exact facility and the exact physician before you call anyone. "The U" isn't specific enough to get a reliable answer.
- Read University of Utah Health's own accepted-insurance page first — the health system publishes what it contracts, and that's a better starting point than any third-party list.
- Then check the plan's directory for the coming plan year, by physician name, one at a time.
- Call both sides and note the reference numbers. Directory errors are common enough that a single source isn't confirmation.
- Compare out-of-pocket maximums, not just network status. $3,500 versus $9,250 is a real difference between two plans that both say yes.
- Open your Annual Notice of Change when it arrives by September 30 — it flags network changes for the coming year, and here's how to read one.
- Redo the whole check every October. The two dated events above happened eighteen months apart. This is not a question you answer once.
How we know all this: the Medicare On Main Data Desk frames every article with public data — here, the CMS CY2026 Medicare Advantage / Part D landscape file, accessed July 2026, for every county figure on this page: the 24 MA-PD offerings and 7 carriers in Salt Lake County, the 8 offerings and 2 carriers in Grand County, the $3,500–$9,250 in-network out-of-pocket maximum range, and the 280 statewide offerings across 28 counties. We count category MA-PD only and say so. The two network events are taken from dated primary announcements: Select Health's May 5, 2022 announcement of the July 1, 2022 addition of University of Utah Health facilities and providers to its Medicare Advantage network, and University of Utah Health Plans' own notice discontinuing its Advantage U Medicare Advantage plans effective January 1, 2024. We deliberately do not publish a current carrier-by-carrier in-network list, because provider contracts change on schedules no third party can track and a stale list is worse than none — U of U Health's own payer pages and your plan's directory are the authorities. Medicare.gov supplies the network, emergency-coverage and out-of-pocket-maximum rules and the 6-month Medigap open enrollment rule; CMS's 2026 Parts A & B fact sheet of November 14, 2025 supplies the $202.90 standard Part B premium and $283 deductible. Carriers and facilities are named because their presence in a dated public announcement is a verifiable fact, not because we recommend any of them. This is education, not advice; confirm your plan, costs, and eligibility with a licensed agent or Medicare.gov. We take no payment from any carrier to feature a plan.
Frequently asked questions
Does University of Utah Health accept Medicare Advantage?
Some Medicare Advantage plans, in some years — and the honest answer for YOUR plan is only available from two places: the plan's own current provider directory and University of Utah Health's own payer pages. It is not a yes-or-no fact about the health system; it is a contract-by-contract, year-by-year fact about each insurer. That's not evasion, it's how provider networks work. Medicare.gov states plainly that Advantage plans can change the providers in the network at any time during the year. Any list you find on a third-party site — including this one — is a snapshot of somebody else's paperwork on some earlier date. Check it yourself, and check it again each fall.
Is Huntsman Cancer Institute in network for Medicare Advantage plans?
It depends entirely on the plan, and this is the case where guessing is most expensive. Huntsman Cancer Institute is part of University of Utah Health, and when Select Health added U of U Health to its Medicare Advantage network effective July 1, 2022, Huntsman was named in the announcement along with University of Utah Hospital, the Moran Eye Center, the University Orthopaedic Center, and the South Jordan, Sugar House and Farmington health centers. That was 2022. Contracts get renegotiated. If a cancer center is part of why you're choosing a plan, verify in writing before you enroll — call the plan, call Huntsman's billing office, and get a reference number for the call.
Did the University of Utah have its own Medicare Advantage plan?
It did, and it doesn't anymore — which is the clearest illustration of why this question needs re-asking every year. University of Utah Health Plans offered Advantage U Signature (PPO), Advantage U Signature Buyback (PPO), and Advantage U for University of Utah Retirees (PPO). Those plans were discontinued effective January 1, 2024, and the health system's own notice told members they "will need to obtain coverage from another Medicare plan for 2024 and beyond." So within about eighteen months, one outside carrier added U of U Health to its Advantage network and U of U's own Advantage plans stopped existing. Neither event was in anyone's mailbox as a headline.
How do I find out if my doctor at the U is in my plan's network?
Look the physician up by name, not the building. "University of Utah Health" covers a hospital, a cancer institute, an eye center, orthopaedics, and a set of community health centers, and the physicians who practice in them can be contracted separately from the facilities. So: search the plan's own online provider directory for each doctor individually; call the plan's member services number on the back of your card and ask them to confirm that specific provider at that specific location for the coming plan year; then call the clinic's billing office and ask the same question. Write down the date and the reference number. When two of those three disagree, the billing office is usually closest to the truth.
What happens if I go to the U and it turns out to be out of network?
On an HMO, non-emergency out-of-network care is generally not covered at all, and you can be responsible for the full bill. On a PPO it's typically covered at a higher cost share and counts toward a separate, higher out-of-network out-of-pocket maximum. Emergencies are the exception in every case: Medicare Advantage plans must cover emergency and urgently needed care without regard to network, so you should never delay an emergency room visit over a network question. The trouble usually starts after the emergency — with the follow-up, the specialist, and the surgery, none of which are emergencies by the time they're scheduled.
Which Medicare Advantage plans are even available where I live in Utah?
Availability and network are two different questions, and it's worth answering them in that order. For 2026 the CMS landscape file lists 24 Medicare Advantage plans with drug coverage in Salt Lake County from 7 carriers, out of 280 MA-PD offerings across Utah's 28 counties. Rural counties are a different world: Grand County — Moab — has 8 plans from 2 carriers. A plan that contracts with University of Utah Health does you no good if it isn't sold in your county, which is why people who see specialists in Salt Lake but live elsewhere in the state have a harder version of this problem than Salt Lake residents do.
Is there a way to avoid the network question entirely?
Yes — Original Medicare with a Medicare Supplement (Medigap) and a stand-alone Part D plan has no network. You can use any provider in the country who accepts Medicare, including University of Utah Health, with no referral and no in-network list to check every fall. The trade is real in both directions: you pay a monthly supplement premium on top of the $202.90 Part B premium plus a separate drug plan, and there's a deadline attached — your one-time 6-month Medigap open enrollment period begins when you're 65 and enrolled in Part B, and outside protected windows Utah insurers may ask health questions. For someone whose care plan runs through a specific academic medical center, that trade is worth pricing carefully.
Sources
- University of Utah Health — Am I Covered? (accepted insurance) — the health system's own list of accepted insurance.
- University of Utah Health — Select Health Update — U of U Health's standing public page on that payer relationship.
- University of Utah Health Plans — Advantage U Medicare Advantage: Plans No Longer Offered — the January 1, 2024 discontinuation of the Advantage U Medicare Advantage plans.
- Select Health — Addition of University of Utah Facilities and Providers to its Medicare Advantage Network (May 5, 2022) — the July 1, 2022 addition of U of U Health facilities and providers to a Medicare Advantage network.
- CMS CY2026 Medicare Advantage / Part D Landscape — every county plan count, $0-premium count, carrier count and out-of-pocket-maximum range on this page.
- Medicare.gov — Medicare Advantage Plans (Part C) — how Advantage networks work, and that plans may change network providers during the year.
- Medicare.gov — Emergency room services — emergency coverage regardless of network.
- Medicare Plan Compare (Medicare.gov) — the official tool for checking plans in your own ZIP.
- Medicare.gov — When can I buy a Medigap policy? — when the one-time 6-month Medigap window opens.
- CMS — 2026 Medicare Parts A & B Premiums and Deductibles (Nov 14, 2025) — the $202.90 standard Part B premium and $283 deductible for 2026.
- CMS — Medicare & You 2026 (official handbook) — Medicare's own plain-language handbook for 2026.
- CDC PLACES, 2023 — via the Medicare On Main Data Desk — county-level chronic-condition prevalence used across our Utah coverage.
