My husband is a 100% disabled veteran and uses the VA exclusively for his care. He did take Medicare Part A (hospital which also includes nursing home care and hospice). No premiums for that. You can use that anywhere in the US.
We did not take Medicare Part B for doctors. We go home for routine doctor appointments. Chuckbear is correct. You will not be able to use the Veterans Choice Plan (read the rules). If you use the VA in other regions you are not in their system and will need to go to the regional office and sign up to get in their system. If it's an emergency you can go to any VA emergency room or any other emergency. If it's a non VA facility emergency room they will need to pre-approve your treatment with your home VA office. Make sure you get the full name and the phone humber of the person the hospital spoke to at the VA. We have only had to use the VA once when we were out of state for an emergency. The cost was $800 and the VA tried to deny it claiming the hospital never called to pre approve the care and that we should have traveled 1.5 hours to the regional VA office ER for treatment!! After 2 years the Florida VA finally paid the bill. If you have a medical problem that will require doctors as you travel and it's not feasible to return to your home VA doctors, I would go ahead and get Medicare Part B. In that case you might also want a supplement to pay for what Medicare doesn't pay.
