Long Term Care Coverage

Long Term Care encompasses many disciplines. First, it is a continuum of care, housing, finance, and services that people will need most likely when they live a long life. It focuses on impact that needing care will have on individual, family, and retirement. While people tend to think of Long Term Care as Nursing Home Insurance, we must change our way of thinking to go beyond this outdated concept. Because over 40% of those receiving LTC are under 65 years of age, LTC can be received by people of any age because of illness or accidents, or a slow progressive chronic condition such as Alzheimer’s Disease.

The other concept to understand is that there is a difference between Long Term Care (LTC) and Long Term Care Insurance (LTCI). Long Term Care Insurance is just money, that’s it! Long Term Care is about love. It is about emotional well being of a person; it’s about their dignity, self worth, companionship, and self purpose. It’s about the person, not the money. And while the financial part of the problem is very important, the personal part should also be addressed. One can be in the best facility in the world and still be lonely.

In 2006, 77 million baby boomers started turning 60 years old. They will get older which means they will get sick, which means they will need care, which means they will have to pay for it. Our Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are already straining from our society; this huge wave of elders just may be enough to break it. Next 10 years will be the Golden Age of LTC.

Consider LTC as you would any other risk management, your health, possessions, earning ability. This will determine what choices you, your family, and loved ones will have if something devastating were to happen to you or them.

We must think differently about what living a long life means.