Medicare is mandated to cover your home health benefits with no limit on the time you are covered. Unfortunately, few Medicare beneficiaries get the level of service they are entitled to, and many find their services cut off prematurely. Getting these benefits can be critically important as Medicare home health care benefits can mean the…
New rules have been put in place to protect seniors with brokerage accounts from financial scams that could drain the accounts before anyone notices. As the population ages, elder financial abuse is a mounting problem. Vulnerable seniors can become victims of scammers who convince them to empty their investment accounts. According to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority…
Figuring out how much to save for retirement and when you can safely stop working can be difficult. A growing number of online retirement calculators, many of them free, are available to help. Although these calculators may yield vastly different results, they can still be useful tools. Based on information about you and your finances,…
If your Medicare drug plan denies coverage for a drug you need, you don’t have to simply accept it. There are several steps you can take to fight the decision. The insurers offering Medicare drug plans choose the medicines — both brand-name and generic — that they will include in a plan’s “formulary,” the roster…
A new study has found that people enrolled in a Medicare Advantage plan were more likely to enter a lower-quality nursing home than were people in traditional Medicare. The study raises questions about whether Medicare Advantage plans are influencing beneficiaries’ decisionmaking when it comes to choosing a nursing home. Medicare Advantage plans, an alternative to…
A long-term care policyholder has successfully sued her insurance company for breach of contract after the company raised her premiums. At age 56, Margery Newman bought a long-term care insurance policy from Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. She chose an option called “Reduced-Pay at 65” in which she paid higher premiums until she reached age 65, when…
While long-term care insurance costs are up in general, some policies are going down in 2018, according to the 2018 Long Term Care Insurance Price Index, an annual report from the American Association for Long-Term Care Insurance (AALTCI), an industry group. A married couple who are both 60 years old would pay an average of $3,490 a…
Caring for an elderly parent can be stressful for families. Siblings may disagree over how to provide care or where a parent will live, and if these squabbles escalate into a guardianship battle, it can cost the family thousands of dollars. To avoid this, lawyers have begun drafting sibling agreements (also called family care agreements)….
A nursing home closure can be traumatic for residents who are forced to move. While there may not be much that can be done to prevent a closure, residents do have some rights. Moving into a nursing home can be a stressful experience on its own. If that nursing home closes, residents can experience symptoms…
Medicare is supposed to provide up to 35 hours a week of home care to those who qualify, but many Medicare patients with chronic conditions are being wrongly denied such care, according to Kaiser Health News. For a variety of reasons, many home health care agencies are simply telling patients they are not covered. Medicare…
