What is the next step?

They have too much money for MEDICAID, not Medicare. If you're a retired working person, you generally are automatically covered by Medicare. Hospice is covered by Medicare.

Chemo? Who is going to drive him back and forth to chemo is something to think about.

Hospice covers comfort care. You should have hospice evaluate while he is in the hospital and give their opinion.

is the discharge planning dept working with you?

how about he goes to rehab in a nursing home for a few weeks? Medicare will generally cover 20 days fully after a hospitalization of three dsys, then another 80 days where he pays 20%. They could start his bedsore healing, get him stable and maybe even start chemo there. You can evaluate from there whether it's wise to bring him home. Make sure he gets that NH is a temporary step.

my two main concerns here are that your father not be in pain and that your mother's health not be compromised by the stress of having dad at home. If you decided ultimately to bring him hone, they clearly need 24/7 care at this point.

is your mom competent to give you poa for her care.

Ohhh, okay. Well, I don't know why my boyfriend had to pay for his mom's hospice then.
That is the family consensus too, the nursing home for exactly what you said: bedsores, and Mommy's well being. But it still always comes back to what he wants, right?!?! Because he still has capacity. And I don't think he would choose chemo or biopsy route.

Re: discharge planning dept, well, we still have not seen a social worker since by the time he got admitted they were gone for the day, but a case manager spoke to me for a bit on Friday and said the social worker would be in on Saturday. But later someone else told me social worker is NOT in on Saturday. Yesterday, my sister and brother talked to someone but I don't know who.

You know, It's really good to have four kids who can divide up duties and not have Mommy worry about anything, but then none of us really knows all the details of what the other has done. How do you people do it just on your own?! This is way too much for one person to handle.

And yes, the poa for Mommy is high priority!! My sister might have even gotten it signed by now. I know she talked to her about it.

Thank you for the clarification, babalou! I am embarrassed to say I don't even know the difference between Medicaid and Medicare.

You do have the option of refusing to take him home. Subjecting him to chemo would only make the final months of his life miserable. A good first step would be the dr ordering rehab. He may agree to that on the idea of P/T to get him walking again. medicare will pay as indicated then Mom will have to pay for N/H till she reaches the amount of funds Medicare specifies. He may be able to recieve hospice in the N/H but he can refuse. it is good the whole family is involved that rarely happens. Eldest son should get the POA if everyone agrees. Hospice will want DNA but that is not mandatory. If hospice has a inpatient facility there maybe payment required everything is income related. choose your facility carefully and visit at different times of the day. If you have money to pay for at least six months beds will be available and you have a much better choice. if he is heavy and difficulty you may need more than one caregiver to turn him and mother should not have to provide any care except maybe feeding him. Let her feel involved but not hands on.
She can feltch the sheets for example and put the towels to warm. hve her in a room where she can't hear what is going on at night. He may get very loud. Hospice would be a good idea when and if his lungs get painful.

Veronica has nailed it. You don't any of you accept discharge. If they threaten to put him in a cab home, you tell them that mom has been admitted to a different hospital for dementia and exhaustion and that there is no one at home to care for him.

Your boyfriend paid for Hospice? That sounds extremely odd.

The way we siblings keep in touch about was is going on is group emails via smart phone . Whenever we visit, get a phone call talk to a doc, we email all the sis and in laws. Have started including the eldest grandchildren as well, so they get to see how it's done.

Cheryl, I didn't understand the difference between Medicare and Medicaid 2 years ago! Don't feel bad. Everything I know about this stuff I've learned right here. Plus, watching cousins care for their parents sometimes well, sometimes badly.

In part, getting your father to agree to rehab is in how you pitch it. Give choices (rehab now with the possibility of returning home when he's stronger, or nh "because mom's not up to taking care of you right, poppy. You've got bedsores. APS can come in and say that mom isn't giving you enough care. You don't want to get the government involved, do you?"

Well, the thing is, Poppy is still competent enough to make his own decisions, yet dementia'd enough to make bad ones about his care. He still wants to get up and walk, for example. If he's in the hospital, he just wants to go home and tries to take all his tubes and things off. So we are in limbo here, and Poppy still retains all his legal rights as a competent person.
Refusing to take him back was a suggestion, but I believe another poster earlier said if we do that, he will end up in the first available opening somewhere, and it could be a bad place. That's something we're not willing to do to my pop. And I did say that to both the admitting doc and the case manager that he can't come back home because my mom can't handle it, etc., but I was basically just trying to get them to keep him a little longer, I guess, or make them try harder to spin it to pop that he needs to go to rehab.
I know my pop will NOT agree to rehab, and we still have to respect his rights. My brother has the best communication with him, so he is going to be there when doctor tells him tomorrow what his options are. My sister thinks poppy won't even agree to hospice. She can just imagine him saying he wants to go home and doesn't want anyone touching him. Again, he is not making good decisions but he still gets to make them. That's why I had my little breakdown the other day. It's so frustrating and stressful.

Just wanted to update on what happened. Suddenly the POA and Poppy's rights seemed to have become a non-issue. My sister and brother went to hospital yesterday while dr. told Poppy his diagnosis etc.: inoperable lung cancer. I was told that Poppy didn't believe it (typical for his personality even before dementia).

It was agreed that he would get the best care in a residential board and care facility which the patient of course has to pay for. It is 3500/month, and he can afford it, so we're grateful for that. He was so mean before he got admitted to ER, but he was so sick, it's no wonder. I went to see him yesterday and he was alert and so very nice. My mom was afraid to see him because he was so mean to her, she didn't know how he would react if he saw her. So I went myself.
I told him Mommy is afraid to see you because she thinks you're still mad at her. And he said, no I couldn't be mad at somebody that I've loved for so many years. Wow. That's really unusual for my stoic Poppy to even express that much emotion.
I went back and got Mommy and took her there because in case something happened, I just didn't want her last memory of him to be a bad one. When we got there, he was sleeping so I woke him up, and we had a short conversation but he was very drowsy. But at least Mommy saw him and she said I love you and he said I love you back.
I've been crying so much, I think partly from stress relief and partly from sadness.
I just wanted to thank you all for your responses and hugs. So much support here, and encouragement, and sooooo helpful, I can't tell you how glad I am to have found this place. Hugs to you all!

You are in our thoughts and prayers. Please share when you need us

Cheryl123 - at some point soon (like now) dad still gets to have opinions, but that doesn't mean you have to honor it when it will not be good for him.

My mother was so full of "I"ll never" and "you won't" and "no no no". It would have been easy for me to say she wouldn't let me help her and just let the situation go.

You guys have already started down this road and doing the right things, so pat yourselves on the back for that. It's a huge accomplishment. H U G E.

When our parents get to a certain point of physical and/or mental frailty, we have to take over. Nobody prepares us or them for it, which is a huge disservice. Nobody wants thier life taken over, but there comes a time when it will happen by people you love or by people the court orders. I'm trying to get myself used to the idea of that. There will come a day when my opinion about my own life doesn't really count anymore, and that is for the best. Seems harsh, but it's true.

Keep fighting the good fight!