Long Term Care Essay

As the baby boomers of the country come to an age on needing long term care, where does Medicaid and Medicare fall into helping with the expenditures these individuals may need? To start let’s look at some numbers; there are about 12 million people out there who require long term care. There are about 40 million unpaid family and friends with about 60 percent of them pulling a full time job. Eleven percent of these people have reported they have had to take an early retirement, leave of absence or resigned to take care of these individuals ((Iglehart 2016 182). The care Medicare provides is as follows: Hospice care: congress recognized the need of terminal care outside of a hospital setting and authorized the reimbursement up to six months for these individuals through the tax equity and fiscal responsibility act of

Medicare will help pay for a short stay in a skilled nursing facility, for hospice care, or for home health care, certain requirements to qualify must be obtained. Medicare will pay for some of the costs for up to 100 days. Medicare pays 100 percent of the individual’s costs, for the first 20 days. Then an individual will pay their own expenses up to $140.00 per day for day 21-100, inflation rates may have changed this number from 2013 (Iglehart 2016 186). Medicare then pays the remainder balance.
The care Medicaid provides is as follows: Medicaid is a joint federal and state government program that helps people with low income and assets pay for some or all of their health care bills. It covers medical care, like doctor visits and hospital costs, long-term care services in nursing homes, and long-term care services provided at home, such as visiting nurses and assistance with personal care. Unlike Medicare, Medicaid does pay for custodial care in nursing homes and at