Navigating How to Cover Elder Care Costs
Challenged with how to pay for elder care services for you or a loved one? The following online resources can help you figure out how you may be able to cover these costs.
ACL.gov/LTC
Managed by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, this website can help you answer questions about:
The costs of long-term care.
Disability and health insurance and how they may or may not pay for long-term care.
Long-term care insurance and what it covers, when coverage begins, how to shop for it, where to look for it and what the costs are.
How you may be able to use life insurance to pay for long-term care through Combination (Life/Long-Term Care) Products, Accelerated Death Benefits or ADBs, life settlements or viatical settlements.
How to pay privately for services through reverse mortgages, annuities and trusts.
Benefits.gov
Run by the federal government, this website is a single source of benefit information set up to help citizens understand which federal benefit programs they may be eligible for and how to apply. Based on the answers you provide, the website’s Benefit Finder can generate benefits you may be eligible for, including health and medical cost assistance.BenefitsCheckup.org
The National Council on Aging online BenefitsCheckUp can help you find federal and state benefit programs that may help your family pay for health care, medications, family caregiver support, respite care and more.
NIA.NIH.gov/Health/Paying-Care
Through this website, the National Institute on Aging offers options to consider when facing paying for long-term care including:
Personal funds such as personal savings, pensions or other retirement funds, income from investments in stocks and bonds and proceeds from the sale of a home.
Government programs and assistance offered through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Medicare, Medicaid, Programs of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACEs), State Health Insurance Assistance Programs, the U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs and Social Security.
Private funding options such as long-term care insurance, reverse mortgages, life insurance, annuities and trusts.
Money Follow the Person Demonstration Project
Money Follows the Person (MFP) is a North Carolina Medicaid demonstration project that assists people living in qualified facilities with moving into their own communities with support.
MFP supports North Carolinians in having more choices about where they receive their long-term support.
MFP identifies and addresses barriers to receiving quality, community-based, long-term care and supports
Participation in MFP is voluntary and funded through a partnership between NC Department of Health and Human Services and the federal Medicaid agency, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Participant Benefits:
MFP participants who meet service eligibility requirements will receive priority access to Medicaid community-based service packages known as Medicaid waivers, or may enroll in the Program for All-inclusive Care for the Elderly.
Transition “Start-Up” Funding: MFP provides additional funding in order to secure items and services needed to transition. This typically includes pre-transition staff training, security deposits, utility start-up expenses, furniture, accessibility modifications or other one-time items and services that may be required to transition.
Call 1-855-761-9030 or visit the MFP web page at: medicaid.ncdhhs.gov/providers/programs-and-services/long-term-care/money-follows-person