Medicaid waiver system easing New York state seniors out of nursing homes

[Judi Lynn]

Seniors Moving Out of Nursing Home System
Medicaid waiver system easing New York state seniors out of nursing homes

ALBANY, N.Y., Jun. 14, 2006
By CANDICE CHOI Associated Press Writer


(AP) Three months after Herman Schneider checked into a nursing home with severe depression, he was ready for life on the outside again _ so he moved into an assisted-living facility.

Schneider, a 78-year-old retired microbiology researcher, said the nursing home experience was difficult.

"I've been a thinking individual all my life _ it was an atmosphere that was totally foreign to me," he said.

Around the country, nursing homes _ once consider life's final stop _ are experiencing a growing number of residents who are packing up and moving out, as more and more seniors receive the help they need through home care or in assisted living settings.

The New York State Health Department, which estimates that caring for seniors in home and community settings can cost up to half as much as nursing homes, is responding to the trend: State officials hope to get a federal waiver this summer that will let up to 5,000 elderly and disabled nursing home residents on Medicaid get the same care elsewhere.
(snip/...)

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/06/14/ap/health/mainD8I7RH780.shtml

[saigon68]

1. Easing them into homeless shelters

[Traveling_Home]

2. ADAPT

We've been fighting for years for the right of seniors and disabled folk to live in the community instead of being shipped to nursing homes. This is great news - do a little checking before comdemning a victory and spinning it into more victimization and defeat.


http://www.adapt.org/casaintr.htm

[saigon68]

3. I'm breathlessly waiting for the second coming

The pukes aren't going to fund this

Their take is these old people were lazy and not prepared to save for their future

[Traveling_Home]

6. Since you don't seem to

care to learn anything that might interfere with you preconceptions (a little knowledge is very dangerous) ain't alot I can teach you but if you follow the link I gave to ADAPT and do a little studying you might be useful when ya grow up.

Always good to know who your fighting for disability rights.

[saigon68]

9. Your condescension is amazing

I don't even know who the fuck you are

And you tell me to grow up

Go cheney yourself

[partylessinOhio]

4. Don't these elderly have to use up their savings and the values of

their homes before they begin getting medicare to pay for their nursing home expense? They won't likely have the money or a home to move back to.

I witnessed this with my two neighbors. The nursing home at $11,000 a month for the two took everything they had in life. They will never get out of the nursing home unless they die.

[Traveling_Home]

8. Not quite

Medicare usually covers short term rehabilitative stays (must be making progress for medicare to be paying. So that situation is usually - grandma broke a hip went into a NH - got better - moved back home. No problem.

For longterm care - if there is a spouse in the home when the other goes to the nursing home, the house is exempt from asset consideration until the spouse in the home passes away.

If someone has a home moves into a nursing home to stay, the house must no longer be an asset before medicaid will start paying the bill for LongTerm NH care.

What needs to be done is from day one instead of hospital Social Workers working on discharge to NH cause it's easier - They need to work on discharge to home with supports instead. There are also financial reasons that discharge to home doesn't occur but you've got the idea. A large chunck of Longtern money is marked for Nursing homes under Medicaid

MiCASSA legislation addresses that inequality.

[Warpy]

5. Well, assisted living is the goal

but when I signed my pop onto the waiting lists, the average cost was about $3,000/month for an efficiency apartment. I don't think Medicaid is picking up the tab for those, not yet.

Had he not been well fixed enough to cope with that kind of rent, I'd have looked into a small apartment near a shopping center with three times a week home health aide visits, a little cheaper and not nearly as safe.

[Traveling_Home]

7. HUD subsidy

For poor disabled or seniors the thing to work on ahead of time is to get in HUD or Section 8 apts and have homecare to assist. Low Income Housing, LEAP, Food Stamps, Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid Waiver put those pieces together - takes time - but most of the roughest bumps can be worked.