His billiard buddies at the O'Conner Senior Center call Johnny Bishop "Big Money."

"When you're on a fixed income, it don't come easy," he says.

He wishes that choosing the right Medicare drug plan were as easy as sinking an unblocked 6-ball in the left corner pocket.I

"When you go through it (all the Part D options) and try to understand it, it just gives you a headache."

The Knox County Community Action Committee's Office On Aging offers in-person counseling to sort through Medicare's on-line options.

"We have an extremely good selection to choose from," says director David Holden.

"In my opinion, its too good.

Holden's volunteers have counseled more than 260 senior citizens to navigate the medicare website. Picking the right plan begins with your doctor's complete list--of every drug you take.

The on-line search will ask you to list your county, your zip code
to determine the drug-plan choices available in your area; fewer than 50 in some of East Tennessee's more rural counties, more than 80 in the urban areas such as Knoxville.

The plans will detail monthly premiums and yearly deductibles.

The Office on Aging will crunch the data, and present a list of what it considers to be your three most-desirable options, based on coverage limits and costs.

The flaw, Holden says, is that government estimates assume that you have the money to pay through the so-called "doughnut hole" if you need it.

The "doughnut hole" is the point at which your Part D coverage stops paying your bills. Next year, the magic number is $2700. Coverage won't resume until your out-of-pocket expenses exceed $4350.

But, the non-profit research organization Consumers' Union, through its magazine Consumer Reports, claims you could delay, or swallow the threat of the doughnut hole, if your doctor okays substitution of generics for proprietary-brand medicines.

Based on cost analyses of medications to treat cholesterol, high-blood pressure, arthritis, and heart-disease, the study claims seniors could cut their yearly medicine bills $4200-$6000 depending upon their coverage plans and where they live.

"The study assumes that generics will yield the same results in every patient," Holden says. "I don't think that's a safe assumption."

Rather, Holden says, the Council on Aging recommends seniors
consider choosing a full-care-and-coverage Medicare Advantage plan, whose open enrollment begins in January.

Johnny Bishop is considering such a plan. But he's awaiting word from Humana, on how his coverage might change, now that Humana has purchased his plan's provider, Cariten.

"If I don't get anything in the next couple of weeks," he says, " I probably will have to start looking."

HERE'S some information from Consumer Reports that compares drug plan options.