I am currently caring for my mother in her home but I know that at some point I may no longer be able to do so. I'm getting conflicting opinions about how to fund her care if she has to go into a nursing home. Is it possible to get compassionate, professional nursing home memory care funded by Medicaid? I'm very concerned about how to get the best care for my Mom knowing that we're not in a position to fund private pay for a sustained length of time. Any suggestions regarding what kind of research I should be doing now in order to prepare in case her needs become more than I am capable of meeting?
What you can do is liquidate all of your mother's assets (real estate, vehicles, bank accounts, insurance policies, etc...) into cash and place her in an excellent memory care facility now. There are ones who accept Medicaid if a resident has paid a certain amount of time on cash-pay. Most placed I've heard of want at least a year or more of cash-pay. Then the person goes on Medicaid when their assets have been spent down, and some facilities allow them to stay.
This could be an option for your mother. Let me tell you something. I've been in the care business for a long time. Anyone in a memory care or nursing home needs a good advocate on the outside who keeps on these people to make sure their LO is getting good care. Even if they're in a high-end place everyone still needs this.
Is her home paid for and in a place to get some cash if sold?
Because sale of home may provide some time in private pay, which is more likely to give on average better care.
You will get a variety of opinion here.
Cover will tell you that there IS no good care for ANYONE in placement.
I will tell you that care is what the particular facility demands it to be and that starts with the top and who is running it, who is hiring and who is firing as well as the availability of good staff to run it.
There are those who will have hard stories to hear.
There are those who will have good ones; my brother's ALF was EXCELLENT.
This is all something you will research in your area on your own, looking at the facilities themselves.
And do know that aging in America is not a pretty picture and has little of perfection in it.
It all comes down to the best that can be done with a bad set of choices.
I am so sorry.
Can't have her in my home. Been there, done that.
Looking forward to hearing what others say:
Lea, where were you going to place your mother, had she not passed away? I remember that she was running out of $ as well.
Medicaid funding may mean that you only have access to a less attractive facility. However - particularly if there is a time first on private pay, and then a transfer to Medicaid - it may be exactly the same care in the same facility. Perhaps a double room, not a single room, but even that varies. Care staff often know nothing about how the care is funded.
It probably makes sense to do the sums about what you can afford, and do the grind of going around and looking at facilities. Opinions can help, but often they don’t.
There isn't any. Not in help, not in hope, not in care.
And that's true whether the care is funded by assets saved over a lifetime or by the state.
So the search for perfection needs to stop where it starts. It starts with knowing that no one, not you alone and not a full coterie of caregivers (no matter who pays their salaries) can make aging anything but very sad and difficult. It is a time of loss upon loss upon loss ending with the loss of the mind and all that made us who we were.
You must now do what you CAN, not what you WISH YOU COULD.
The search begins with a collection of assets available for care, and with visits to Nursing Home Facilities in your area.
Questions:
1. If my mother enters as a private pay client, when her assets are gone can she stay here with Medicaid funds?
2. What are your costs of care and what levels of care do you provide (usually I-IV). What constitutes what category and level my Mom is on.
3. What activities do you provide.
4. May I attend a lunch and eat a meal here?
and so on.
While visiting you will examine for safety, cleanliness, and etc and more questions will come to you as you go. Their policy of how much they are willing to show you will tell it all.
Good luck. But PLEASE, relieve yourself of expectations of perfection. That isn't going NEARLY to be possible.
Most states' Medicaid does not cover AL or MC, although there are Elder Waiver programs that each state and county may have, which provides *some* assistance for keeping an elder "in the community" (meaning in their home). This also requires application, which can be researched on your Mom's county Dept of Health website (and social services). But in the vast majority of cases, it eventually is not enough once the elder's daily needs increase.
I recommend you have a discussion with a certified elder law attorney for your home state, or an estate planner or a Medicaid Planner for your state. This is a global forum of plain ol' caregivers and care receivers so we aren't professionals and cannot be relied upon to give you the most appropriate advice on which to make your future decisions. Just pointing you in a hopefully helpful direction.
I wish you all the best as you plan.
She went into their AL on an Elder Waiver and then when in LTC went on to Medicaid. She receives the same level of care as all other residents not on Medicaid.
Just saying that these "unicorn" places do exist, you need to look for them.