A White House task force on meeting the needs of middle-class families today proposed to spend an additional $102 million to assist caregivers of aging relatives. The initiative includes an extra $52.5 million for respite care--a program enacted by Congress in 2006 but never fully funded. It is very important that the Obama Administration recognizes that caring for our parents is critical to many [...]
Republican Scott Brown's stunning victory in the Massachusetts Senate race has obviously turned the health reform debate on its head. Without a 60-vote majority in the Senate, Democrats are no longer assured of passing a major health bill. But what will this mean for long-term care reform? There are three key long-term supports and services issues at stake--expansion of Medicaid home and [...]
Why can't The Washington Post ever get it right when it comes to long-term care. Its latest self-embarrassment came with a piece it ran today comparing elder care in the U.S. with similar assistance in France and the U.K. According to the author, a psychologist named Sara Mansfield Taber, elderly women in England and France receive far better care than the writer's mother [...]
Connie Garner, the top Senate staffer on long-term care issues, said today that she is certain the CLASS Act, which would create a new national long-term care insurance program, will be included in the final health bill being considered by Congress. "I don't have any question CLASS will survive," Garner told a long-term care conference sponsored by the journal Health Affairs. [...]
You hear it all the time: "Medicare will only pay for rehab or personal care as long as you are getting better. If you are no longer improving after, say, a stroke, these benefits will stop." But according to the Center for Medicare Advocacy, a non-profit patient's rights group, this "improvement standard" may have become ingrained in the care system, but it [...]