Growing old is inevitable. You’ll come to a point that your health starts to decline and you experience physical changes that make it hard for you to do some of your daily living activities and moving to a long term care facility is now an option.

It’s important to plan for this care need early to make sure that you are financially ready for the costs and you can age the way you want. For this month’s roundup, we’re featuring five articles that can help you prepare for your potential long term care needs. These articles highlight long term care challenges that need to be addressed right away.

Cost of nursing home care makes planning ahead crucial for financial security

Tamara Holmes of USA Today stresses the importance of considering the cost of Nursing home care by sharing the experience of former Wisconsin Gov. Martin J. Schreiber. His wife was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and it was hard and devastating for him. According to him, buying long term care insurance for his wife is the best decisions he had made.

When planning for long term care, it’s important to determine your unique needs first, know the cost of care, set an ultimate goal, explore your financial options and purchase coverage that you can afford.

In case of a worst-case scenario, having some coverage for long term care is still better than having no coverage at all.

Read Next: What Does Long Term Care Insurance Cover?

The Current Challenges Facing Nursing Homes

Nursing homes perform a critical role in the long term care industry that is often overlooked. These facilities are responsible for providing care to aging Americans and even those with severe physical and mental disabilities.

Since more people are getting older, nursing homes are expected to keep up with this and to overcome the risks and challenges involved in this change. And some looming challenges in nursing home care delivery include staffing levels, financial penalties, growth of other healthcare sectors, monetary challenges and increasing care needs of patients.

In order to continuously thrive in the industry, nursing homes need to adopt best practices of the industry. These practices include initiatives for recruiting, training and retaining staff members who are qualified and adherence to regulatory standards.

Aging California Seniors Will Need Caregivers, And Family Is First Up

According to research by the Public Policy Institute California, about 19% or 1 in 5 people will be 65 and older which is up from 12% back in 2012. In preparation for the upward swing of seniors in California, state officials are working on a plan to prepare for this long term care challenge.

Middle-income families are the ones who will be strongly affected since they don’t qualify for state assistance and they don’t have enough funds to pay for long term care services. They need to step up and take the caregiving responsibility, which is physically and financially straining.

To help family caregivers in taking care of their aging parents, the state operates a program called In-Home Supportive Services that identify seniors with low income that need help basic assistance to stay at home and pays for family caregiving. The pay is usually minimum wage but it’s better than nothing since family caregivers are known to cut back hours in their jobs just to take care of their parents.

Read: How to Cope with the Emotional and Financial Toll of Family Caregiving

Providers rebut conclusions drawn in long-term care suicide article

According to the article of Marty Stempniak of McKnight’s, nursing home industry advocates are rebuking what Kaiser Health News has initially reported, that large numbers of seniors are quietly committing suicide in facilities all over the U.S.

In the 918 potential suicides related to long term care, only a few cases happened in nursing homes or other long term care facilities according to AHCA VP of Public Affairs, Beth Martino.

It is a tragic event that is happening right now but it’s not exclusive on long term care facilities. In fact, there were only 26 suicides in one year in all long term care settings out of millions of residents admitted annually. The low rates are because of the efforts of Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services in requiring all nursing facilities to assess each resident for depression before admitting them and to develop a care plan to address depressive symptoms.

The numbers presented were true but these cases do not involve people who reside in nursing homes or other long term care facilities.

MY VIEW FROM HERE: Addressing trauma in long-term care

One long term care aspect that is often overlooked is the special needs of seniors who are trauma survivors when they start to need long term care. Types of trauma include abuse, assault, human-caused disasters, military duty, serious illness, forced displacement, and others.

When it’s time for individuals to receive long term care in a facility, they might exhibit loss of interest, panic attacks, chronic pain, depression, insomnia, eating disorders and others. These symptoms of post-traumatic stress are varied and would pose a challenge to the staff of a facility. They’re not expected to become experts in treating trauma but instead, they can help in reducing or eliminating triggers for a resident to have these episodes.

According to Edith Kerby Mann, striking a balance between emotional and physical safety can be one move in providing trauma-informed care. Trauma-Informed care realizes the prevalence and impact of trauma. The staff knows how to handle this situation since they can assess the signs and symptoms of trauma, injecting this information to its practices and policies to prevent re-traumatization.

Final Word

Identifying and addressing these long term care challenges can help a lot of aging Americans prepare for their care needs especially now that more people are getting older and long term care services and settings are becoming more expensive.

If you need help in planning for long term care, we can help you explore your options and simplify them for you. We will provide you with all the information you need to insurance costs and benefits of best available policies from top providers to help you make an informed decision. Get started by completing our quote form.

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