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?
Not all facilities accept Medicaid so ask first.
I live in Wisconsin. There are a few local assisted living memory care facilities that take Medicaid eligible residents right from the beginning of their stay even without a private pay time period. Of course, they are difficult to get in to, so you must visit those places and get her name on a waiting list.
My 93 year old mom with dementia was showing signs about 4-5 years ago. We cared for her at home as best as we could ourselves and later with outside help, but last year it became too much for us and for her to continue living in her own home. Fortunately, I had visited every local care facility I could so we knew which facility we would prefer to have her in. Luckily, there was an opening and she was on the waiting list so we were able to move her into a Medicaid eligible room. I made sure that the room she was in was Medicaid eligible because I knew her money would run out in less than two years. Granted, the room is a smaller sized studio and not a big one bedroom, but it is in a very nice facility. It is part of a progressive care organization so if she needs to later move to a nursing home, she is already be in their system and could be moved there if necessary.
Our local ADRC has dementia specialists and Medicaid specialist that have helped me tremendously. Good luck to you...it is a huge, stressful job when you are the primary care giver.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.