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Will Medicare Cover My Mother’s Nursing Home Care?
August 25th, 2017

One of the most crucial issues facing seniors today is the need for long-term care. With the costs of long-term care steadily rising, including home healthcare, assisted living facilities, and skilled nursing care homes, and our population rapidly aging, making arrangements for long-term care in advance has become a necessity. While you cannot anticipate and prepare for every situation that may arise, you can educate yourself about the options available to you.
Despite what many Americans believe, eligibility for Medicare at age 65 does not also make you eligible for long-term care. Medicare is a federal health insurance program that has no financial eligibility rules. However, Medicare covers only about nine percent of the country’s nursing home care, which includes extended care following a hospital stay. Therefore, you should not count on Medicare to cover your long-term care costs.
The more common scenario is that individuals who need long-term care quickly deplete what assets they have managed to accrue, and then must rely on Medicaid for long-term care coverage. While individuals often confuse the two programs, Medicaid and Medicare are completely separate programs that cover different types of expenses and have different eligibility requirement. Unlike Medicare, Medicaid is a joint state and federal welfare program that offers various levels of medical coverage for individuals with limited resources, including coverage for nursing home expenses.
One of the best steps that you can take prior to ever needing long-term care is to purchase long-term care insurance. By purchasing a long-term care insurance policy early, while you are still healthy enough to do so, you can ensure that you have adequate coverage for long-term care expenses, particularly if you also qualify for Medicaid coverage at some point.
Making decisions about long-term care is difficult, no matter what your circumstances may be. Ensuring that your elderly parents have a long-term care plan in place well in advance of the need for nursing home care is an important step that all caregivers must take. Fortunately, when you don’t know where to turn for help, Legacy Law Center is a valuable resource that you can access as needed. If you or a loved one is in this situation, you should definitely contact an experienced Michigan elder law attorney at Legacy Law Center right away. Call Terrence Bertram at Legacy Law Center today and see what we can offer you and your family.
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