Naples Comprehensive Health, one of Southwest Florida’s largest nonprofit hospital systems, will go out of network with two Medicare Advantage insurers at the end of 2026, part of a wave of contract breaks between hospitals and insurers spreading across the state. Centene’s Wellcare and HCSC’s HealthSpring Medicare Advantage plans will no longer include Naples Comprehensive Health’s hospitals and physicians once the new plan year begins, according to Becker’s Hospital Review’s ongoing tracking of these disputes. For older residents of Collier County who built their care around the system, the split forces a decision well before most people start thinking about Medicare’s fall enrollment window.
What Naples Comprehensive Health Is Changing for 2027
Naples Comprehensive Health confirmed it will end its contracts with Wellcare, Centene’s Medicare Advantage brand, and HealthSpring, HCSC’s Medicare Advantage brand, effective at the end of 2026, according to Becker’s Hospital Review’s list of health systems dropping Medicare Advantage plans this year. The change means the system’s hospitals, physicians, and outpatient sites will no longer be considered in-network for members enrolled in either plan starting with the 2027 plan year.
Unlike a Medicare Advantage plan leaving a county entirely, a hospital-network termination like this one does not force affected members out of their plan. Wellcare and HealthSpring enrollees who take no action will keep the same Medicare Advantage plan on January 1, 2027; what changes is whether Naples Comprehensive Health counts as in-network for that plan, not whether the plan itself continues to exist or gets sold to them by a different insurer.
The break is not an isolated event in the region. The same Becker’s Hospital Review tracking shows Fort Myers-based Lee Health, another major Southwest Florida system, is separately going out of network with UnitedHealthcare Medicare Advantage plans on the same end-of-2026 timeline, meaning two of the area’s largest hospital systems are cutting ties with Medicare Advantage insurers within months of each other.
Free download: How to read the Annual Notice of Change, spot the cost, drug and network changes, and decide whether to keep or switch. Get the free 2027 plan-change checklist.
What Going Out of Network Actually Means for Medicare Advantage Members
The practical effect of the split depends heavily on plan type. Members enrolled in an HMO-style Wellcare or HealthSpring Medicare Advantage plan typically have no coverage at all for non-emergency care received at an out-of-network hospital, while members in a PPO version of the same plans usually retain some coverage, just at a steeper out-of-pocket cost. Either way, a beneficiary who has relied on Naples Comprehensive Health for years could face a materially different bill for the identical care starting January 1, 2027.
Contract breaks like this one are also part of a wider financial standoff between hospitals and Medicare Advantage insurers nationally. Providers dropping plans commonly point to claim denials and slow reimbursement, and the dispute is unfolding as insurers themselves are simultaneously cutting Medicare Advantage benefits and exiting markets to protect margins that thinned over the past two years. That squeeze is pushing both sides of the relationship, hospitals and insurers, toward fewer and narrower agreements at the same time.
Florida carries one of the country’s largest concentrations of Medicare beneficiaries enrolled in a Medicare Advantage plan rather than Original Medicare, which means a single hospital-insurer dispute in a market like Naples can touch a larger share of local retirees than an identical dispute would in a state where fewer people carry Medicare Advantage to begin with. That density is part of why disputes involving Florida systems draw outsized attention from brokers and patient advocates tracking the broader national pattern.
Patients in the middle of ongoing treatment have one narrow protection worth checking. Federal continuity-of-care rules can, in some circumstances, let a beneficiary finish an active course of treatment, such as chemotherapy or a post-surgical recovery plan, at an in-network rate for a limited period even after a hospital’s contract ends, but the exception generally has to be requested from the insurer before the termination date rather than after coverage has already changed.
What Affected Members Can Do Before Coverage Changes
Beneficiaries enrolled in a Wellcare or HealthSpring Medicare Advantage plan who rely on Naples Comprehensive Health have until Medicare’s Annual Enrollment Period, which runs October 15 through December 7, to switch plans, change insurers, or return to Original Medicare with a supplemental policy ahead of the January 1 network change. Confirming a hospital’s network status directly with the insurer, rather than relying on a plan’s provider directory, is the safer approach, since directories can lag real contract changes by weeks or months.
Members who wait and later decide to leave Medicare Advantage because a hospital they rely on left the network may also qualify for a federal guaranteed-issue right to buy a Medigap policy without medical underwriting, provided they apply within roughly two months of their Medicare Advantage coverage ending. Missing that window can mean facing medical underwriting on a supplement plan for the first time in years.
Naples Comprehensive Health and the two insurers have not announced a renewed agreement as of Becker’s most recent update, and the end-of-2026 termination date stands. Members with appointments, procedures, or ongoing treatment scheduled to continue past that date are better served confirming their options during this year’s enrollment period than waiting for a last-minute deal that, in other regional disputes tracked by Becker’s, has sometimes materialized and sometimes has not.
Confirming a Network Change Before the Naples Contract Ends
A hospital system’s own announcement rarely spells out what a specific Medicare Advantage plan will actually pay for out-of-network care, and provider directories are often the last thing insurers update once a contract like this one has ended. That gap between the announcement and a household’s own paperwork is where a wrong assumption gets expensive.
The 2027 Medicare Open Enrollment Decision Kit is a 42-page decision kit built around a provider call script and a cost calculator spreadsheet that compares plans on cost, drugs and doctors, plus the Open Enrollment calendar for tracking deadlines like this one.
Confirm a plan’s network status before it changes with The 2027 Medicare Open Enrollment Decision Kit.
This article was researched and drafted with the assistance of AI and reviewed by The Money Overview editorial team.
