Renown Health in Reno, Nevada, will stop scheduling appointments for patients on Medicare Advantage plans that leave it out of their networks, starting January 1, 2027. Until December 31, 2026, those patients can still schedule and attend appointments at Renown.
Renown says it mailed letters in August 2026 to patients on affected plans. The letter’s message is blunt: a patient who stays on an out-of-network plan cannot book at Renown once the new year begins.
A cutoff for booking, not a ban on care
The wording on Renown’s Medicare Advantage updates page is specific. Patients “will not be able to schedule appointments at Renown if they remain on an out-of-network Medicare Advantage plan,” and the cutoff applies from January 1, 2027.
That differs from a contract dispute in which a hospital leaves one named insurer. The page does not name the plans that are in or out of network for 2027. Patients only learn where they stand from the August letter, or by asking their plan.
What can still happen before the year ends
Through December 31, patients on those plans can keep existing appointments and make new ones. Anyone who stays on or enrolls in an out-of-network plan will need to find a new provider beginning January 1, Renown says.
The page lists Reno, Sparks, Carson City, Fallon, Fernley and Silver Springs among its Nevada locations, which is why the change reaches well beyond a single clinic. A patient with a standing specialist appointment in the spring would be the first to notice that the booking system no longer accepts the plan.
For a Renown patient on a Medicare Advantage plan, the question is therefore whether the plan named in the August letter is the plan that will be active on January 1. A patient who wants to remain at Renown has to change plans during Medicare’s annual enrollment period, which runs from October 15 to December 7, 2026.
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Renown has not published how many patients received the August letter, and it does not name an executive or spokesperson on the page. Nor does it say which Medicare Advantage insurers it works with, which leaves patients to find out from the letter, the plan or a counselor whether their own coverage is affected.
The two ways to stay with Renown
Renown says patients can use the enrollment period to pick a Medicare Advantage plan that contracts with it or to return to Original Medicare for 2027. The first keeps a private plan with its extras and its network limits. The second removes the network question but changes how costs and drug coverage work.
Renown also notes that Five-Star Medicare Advantage plans can be enrolled in at any time during the year. That is a separate special rule, and it applies only to plans carrying Medicare’s top quality rating, so it will not help a patient whose plan of choice has fewer stars.
Medicare’s plan finder lists the plans sold at a ZIP code, with costs and drug coverage. Medicare’s page on health plans explains when and how to join, switch or drop a plan.
The timing leaves a real window, and it is not an obvious one. Letters went out in August, the enrollment period opens October 15, and it closes December 7, so a patient who acts promptly has roughly seven weeks to compare plans and still has the rest of December to confirm network details before the January 1 cutoff.
Confirming a plan really includes Renown
Renown tells patients to review their options on Medicare.gov, then confirm with the insurance plan itself that Renown and the specific provider will be in network for 2027. A broker or a State Health Insurance Assistance Program counselor can also help.
That second step is the one that matters. A plan’s directory can lag, and a hospital system can be in network while a particular doctor’s group is not. Counselors at the State Health Insurance Assistance Program offer local, confidential Medicare counseling at no cost, including help checking provider networks.
Questions about Medicare itself can go to 1-800-MEDICARE, 1-800-633-4227, which is open around the clock except for some federal holidays. Renown lists its own numbers as 775-982-4100 for general inquiries and 775-982-4130 for billing, and says its scheduling office handles questions about existing appointments or continuity of care.
Retirees with employer coverage should wait to act
One group is told to slow down. Renown says retirees whose Medicare coverage comes through a former employer should contact that benefits office before making any changes. Leaving a retiree group plan for an individual one can be hard to undo, and the employer’s plan may follow different network rules.
For everyone else on Medicare Advantage in the Reno area, the order of operations is simple: read the August letter, find out which plans are in network, then act before December 7.
Letter from Renown in the mailbox?
A Renown patient who misses the December 7 cutoff would likely be locked into a plan that Renown will not schedule on January 1, and the only fix would be finding a new provider mid-treatment.
The 2027 Medicare Open Enrollment Decision Kit includes a provider call script and a cost calculator spreadsheet that compares plans on cost, drugs and doctors. The script gives the exact questions to put to a plan about Renown and to a doctor’s office about each plan, and the spreadsheet puts the answers side by side.
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This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
