Hospice services are covered by Medicare, room and board is not. If a person qualifies for Medicaid, then Medicaid pays for room and board. Here, in Massachusetts, nursing homes cost over $500 per day.......for half of a room. The people who work in the nursing home where my mom resides work very hard to provide good care, but I don't understand why it costs so much per day. Helping my parents in their end of life journey has certainly been eye-opening.
I guess my mother is getting a "bargain" at $210 a day nursing care, which is $6300 for a 31-day month (in the Cincinnati area). I understand they are even less in some of the Gulf/south central states. I grew up in the NYC area (NE NJ), so I'm certain they're a lot more expensive there, as BarbBrooklyn and others have mentioned. When my father had hospice care, this was in the nursing home, too, and I'm not aware of additional charges but my sister handles the paperwork. I wasn't even aware he was on hospice until I asked about the fancy blue mattress he was on.
Like others have said, in-home hospice care is covered by Medicare 100% (including some meds, like heart meds). A facility stay is not. Medicare will cover 5-day respite care stay in a nursing home while someone is receiving in-home hospice care, but that is it.
@Katie22 this us exactly what happened with my mother! Thank goodness she was paralyzed from the waist down, so she couldn't feel the bedsore that was so bad you could see her bone :( they never took care of her, they didn't turn her, and we didn't understand the problem with the broken hospice system until it was too late.
Just saw this message after having a nice talk with my sister in law about hospice care for her husband. They live in North Carolina and her husband received hospice care at home all paid for by Medicare. It makes me wonder: Does it make a difference where one lives? Rules are different in different states, I suppose.
My dad was transferred by the VA Hospital in Houston to Houston Hospice. I was told that Medicare would pay for everything and I never even saw a bill. I don’t understand why it was that way and you are having to pay. Can someone explain? My heart goes out for you in this difficult time. I could not bring my father to my house because I have a son with autism and could not care for both in the same place.
Hospice Care is not the same as nursing home care. And it also depends on if the hospice unit is located inside a hospital. If it is located inside a hospital, then Medicare parts A and B would cover the cost. But if it is a private facility, then regular Insurance rules don't apply. Private facilities are not obligated to accept any type of insurance. They can be strictly private pay.
I was so angry at nursing homes failures when Mom was in for rehab stints and the audacity to charge these prices when they let people lie there with soiled briefs getting bedsores and feeding them hot dogs in what were rated 5 star facilities by Medicare, that I took my Mom home for 7 months on hospice. The hospice part is paid by Medicare but the room is not. The nursing home system in this country is broken. One can tell something is wrong when you would be better off booking a cruise ship cabin with a nurse to care for you.
In my case, where my husband was the patient, they accepted the full amount of his Social Security check, which was sent directly to the nursing home. They accepted it "Medicaid Pending," meaning that if the Social Security check did not go to them, they would use his Social Security. I think they also used his S.S. until Medicaid did kick in. I used this method because a nurse on our hospice team had done that for her mother. The nursing home staff showed me how to do it. Since my income was a little higher than my husband's, i was able to manage. Those were difficult days. Best wishes to you.
My mom was admitted to the hospital as an emergency and transferred to the hospice on another floor for 6 days until her passing (in NY). Medicare did cover it this so maybe it depends on where.
In my experience, Hospice was free. The facility a person uses while under Hospice is not. Often they are home. IF they are in a NH, or ALF, whatever, they still have to pay the cost of the facility.
Medicare but the room is not. The nursing home system in this country is broken. One can tell something is wrong when you would be better off booking a cruise ship cabin with a nurse to care for you.