096 – Interview: Paying for Long-Term Care: 2019 Updates

Dr. K talks with Howard Gleckman, senior fellow at the Urban Institute and an expert on how policy and tax issues affect older adults and their long-term care. He is also the author of Caring for Our Parents: Inspiring Stories of Families Seeking New Solutions to America’s Most Urgent Health Crisis. They discuss:

What is “long-term care” and who usually ends up paying for it
Why so many older adults end up needing some form of long-term care
That it’s Medicaid, not Medicare, that sometimes covers long-term care needs for older adults
What “triggers” need to occur for long- term care insurance policies to kick-in
Currently available options to pay for long-term care and “ongoing living assistance”
Why insurers have had difficulty offering affordable long-term care insurance
What happened to the federal long-term care program the CLASS act
How Washington State’s new public long-term care insurance plan is set up, and why it won’t help today’s older adults
The new Medicare rules that might enable Medicare Advantage plans to offer the “non-medical” services that can help older adults age in place
What are the benefits of Medicare Advantage care plans
What politicians are saying about this, and why we don’t hear more about long-term care issues