What is the difference between a Medicare card and a Social Security card? Are they the same card?

Many citizens have applied for social security cards and medical insurance cards, what is the difference between social security cards and medical insurance cards?

The Medicare card is a magnetic stripe card, which is only used for medical treatment and visits to health insurance organizations. The social security card is an integrated circuit card with an 8K-byte CPU, which has functions such as information storage, electronic vouchers, information inquiry, etc. It can also be used for medical treatment and real-time settlement with the card. It has been widely used in public security, social security, medical insurance, civil affairs, provident fund and other departments. There is no need to apply for a medical insurance card after applying for a social security card.

Difference between social security card and medical insurance card:

In terms of content, the information on social security card includes basic personal information, employment information, labor contract management, wage and income management, occupational qualification, pension insurance, unemployment insurance, medical insurance, work injury insurance and maternity insurance, etc. The basic information of labor security, employees can enjoy all kinds of labor security services with this card in hand; while the information in the medical insurance card only contains the basic medical insurance information of the insured and the medical account fund situation, and does not include other contents.

Functional application, the social security card has information records, business operations, electronic vouchers and information query and other basic functions, it records the cardholder's basic information and related business information, the cardholder can hold the social security card through the on-line or off-line for labor and employment, training and social security services, social security card can be used as an electronic voucher for the The social security card can be used as an electronic credential for personal identity authentication, and the cardholder can check his/her basic information, employment information and various social insurance information through the card-reading devices at the social security card service outlets. The affairs that can be handled by the social security card in the labor and social security departments include: registering for employment, registering for unemployment, applying for unemployment insurance, registering for job-seeking, applying for old-age pension insurance, applying for maternity insurance, taking part in the government-funded vocational training The medical insurance card only records and stores the funds and use of the individual medical account of the cardholder, and can be used for medical treatment at designated medical institutions and dispensing or purchasing of medicines at designated retail pharmacies, as well as reimbursement of relevant medical expenses, while the medical insurance card only records and stores the funds and use of the individual medical account of the cardholder. The medical insurance card only records and stores the individual medical account funds and the use of the card holder in the basic medical insurance designated medical institutions and in the designated retail drugstores to dispense or purchase drugs, in addition to other social security matters.

The social security card is mainly used in the field of basic medical insurance. Generally speaking, the biggest advantage of social security cards over traditional health insurance cards is that they can be used for real-time settlement.

Taking Shenzhen as an example, in the past, insured people had to pay upfront, and the reimbursement process took at least two to three months. For hospitals and employers, hospital outpatient medical expenses have to be audited and settled manually, and employers have to collect and organize the expense documents before reimbursement, which inadvertently increases the workload.

With the social security card, the insured do not need to take a lot of cash to the hospital, because the social security card realizes zero advance payment. With the card, patients are only responsible for their own personal out-of-pocket and out-of-pocket medical expenses, and reimbursable expenses are settled directly between the medical institution and the health insurance department. The difficult problem of reimbursement, which often took months to resolve in the past, may now be easily resolved in just a few dozen seconds.

Another major drawback brought about by the medical insurance card is that hospitals are governed by their own rules, and the visiting cards of different hospitals cannot be used by each other, which brings inconvenience to patients in seeking medical treatment.

Serving people and facilitating them has always been the ultimate goal of our country, so in order to serve people the social security card can replace the medical card, realizing the medical card. Because the social security card has the function of recording and querying information, the patient's data can be stored, the social security card has become a continuous record of electronic medical records, which is conducive to a better understanding of the medical history of the doctor and diagnosis and treatment.