Short Term and Long Term Care Insurance for Baby Boomers

Every now and then, we all need medical attention. Of course, it is not something we’re over the moon about, but hey, one can’t avoid the inevitable. Based on the severity of your ailment or disease, your Doctor will make recommendations and suggestions. He will decide whether your medical condition requires short term or long term care. What does this mean, you ask? Well, today, we will go over the difference between short term and long term care insurance and practices.

nursing home insurance
Source: very well health

Short Term Care: As the name suggests, short term care is temporary and brief. It provides medical and custodial services. This kind of medical care usually includes post-surgery care, physiotherapy, trauma care management, recovery from an accident, postpartum recovery, rehabilitation facilities, and other ailments that are goal oriented and demands that the patient receiving this type of care stays at the medical facility for a specific period.

This can vary from weeks to months or even longer based on the severity of your condition and on factors such as your body’s mechanism to cope with the treatment and its responsiveness to the medical care you are receiving. For instance, a person recovering from an accident may be given home care as opposed to a person who underwent surgery who is required to live at a medical facility for a specific period of time so his or her caregiver can monitor the patient’s condition and recovery.

Read more about the FAQs on Short Term and Respite Care

Short term medical care includes services such as wound dressing and sanitation, administration of prescription drugs and injections, saline treatment, patient education, post surgery consultation and care, monitoring and rehabilitative therapy.

short term care insurance
Source: knowledge stuff

Short term care insurance policies typically pay for services that include the intervention of a medical professional. Services that involve home care and assisted living. Short term insurance policies do not pay for years at a stretch, instead it pays for benefits for twelve months or less. Many policies have a 0 day deductible and a full year of benefits. Most people find this very affordable and convenient.

Long Term Care: Long term care includes a stay at a nursing home for long periods of time, personal assistance at home, adult day care centers, assisted living facilities and skilled nursing facilities, collectively known as long-term care facilities or LTCFs. This is a care type designed especially for our senior citizens who need help with simple everyday activities such as bathing, using the toilet, getting dressed, eating, grooming and other everyday activities that we take for granted. It caters to patients with serious medical conditions like Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, renal failure, cancer care, strokes and other critical illnesses.

Learn more about short term and long term care insurance

long term care insurance
Source: national care planning council

Many Long-term care insurance policies cover a variety of medical services such as home care, assisted living, adult daycare, respite care, hospice care, nursing home, Alzheimer’s facilities, etc. The coverage usually kicks in from day one and continues based on the terms and conditions of the policy you enroll under

There are two types of long term policies: Traditional policies and combination or hybrid policies.

The average cost of long term care is approximately $225 a day or $6,844 per month for a semi-private room in a nursing home, and $253 a day or $7,698 per month for a private room in a nursing home.

long term care planning
Source: insight law

Typically long-term care facilities offer a high level of medical care and support, while short term care facilities provide support with recovery and rehabilitation. Long term care involves the treatment of chronic and critical illnesses such as heart attacks, strokes, ALS, renal failure and the likes. Short term care offers services like speech therapy, counselling, occupational therapy, post trauma care, physiotherapy etc.

You will find more information on the benefits, eligibility and deductibles of long term care insurance

Are you  looking for professional advice on this topic. How about booking a consultation with our experts here at Flagship Financial

Cost Of Healthcare

When it comes to healthcare in the United States of America, there is no ‘one size fits all’ program per se. That the healthcare costs in the U.S is extremely high is not unheard of. Let’s start by understanding the core of the healthcare sector and delve into the intricacies and costs that are associated with health care plans in the United States.

Healthcare insurance coverage is provided by several private and public sources in the United States. A vast majority of the American population is covered under a Federal program called Medicare, which covers a pool of 53 million people over the age of 65. Approximately 272 million people under the age of 65 either obtained their coverage from employer-based (155 million) or non-employer based (90 million) sources or were uninsured (27 million).

cost of healthcare in us
Source: eating disorders review

Approximately 15 million military personnel received coverage through the Veteran’s Administration. Another joint federal and state program called Medicaid helps with medical costs for some people with limited income and resources. You may qualify for free or low-cost care through Medicaid based on income and family size. Medicaid provides health coverage for most low-income people, families and children, pregnant women, the elderly, and people with disabilities. This program is applicable in every state in the United States of America. This was a brief overview on the different Federal Programs one can qualify for within the United States.

Costs: In the U.S. medical industry, you as a patient will have to wait until after a medical service is provided in order to get access to the pricing information. More often than not, it is the insurance companies and other institutional payers that are privy to pricing schedules. Most Doctors, hospitals and medical practices choose not to share these schedules with the patient and engage the insurance carriers instead. For those who are uninsured, the pricing schedule is presented after the medical procedures are carried out. They have to pay these medical bills out of their own pockets.

Learn more about U.S. healthcare spending

how much is health insurance
Source: insurance medics

Organizations such as the American Medical Association (AMA) and AARP support a fair and accurate valuation for all physician services. The main objective of such organizations was to ensure that every American citizen has access to pricing schedules and was given a fair price opportunity for the medical service they were provided.

Medicare and Medicaid: Medicare spending went up by $22 billion which was nearly 4% in the year 2017. The rise in this trend was mainly because of an increase in the number of people who enrolled under this program. Medicaid spending rose by $7 billion (2%). The Affordable Care Act is partly responsible for this upward movement. Medicare spending was $595 billion and Medicaid spending was $375 billion. Medicare covered 57 million people as of September 2016. While, Medicaid covered 68.4 million people as of July 2017, 74.3 million including the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).

Medicare and Medicaid
Source: angel companions

Learn more about National Health Expenditure fact sheet

Individual Costs: The estimated health insurance premium for single coverage was $6,400 and family coverage was $15,500 in 2016. These figures were estimated by The CBO (Congressional Budget Office). These costs are usually covered by an individual’s employer. According to a report by the Kaiser Family Foundation a family insurance premium averaged $18,142 in 2016, up 3% from 2015, with the employee paying $5,277 towards that cost and employers covering the rest. Single coverage premiums were essentially unchanged from 2015 to 2016 at $6,400, with employees contributing $1,129 and employers covering the remainder. According to eHealthInsurance, premiums for individual coverage averaged $321 per month while premiums for family plans averaged $833 per month. The average annual deductible for individual plans was $4,358 and the average deductible for family plans was $7,983.

health insurance premium
Source: tomorrow makers

Deductibles: Deductibles grew by 63% from 2011 to 2016, while premiums increased 19%. In 2016, 4 in 5 workers had an insurance deductible, which averaged $1,478.

Prescription Drugs: According to a report by the OECD, an average American spent nearly $1,162 on prescription drugs in 2015 alone.

With a GDP of $19 trillion in 2015/16, healthcare costs were about $3.2 trillion, or about $10,000 per person in a country of 320 million people.

As costs increase more people are enrolling under different federal/private insurance programs to safeguard themselves and their families. The total sum of uninsured people in the United States has seen a downward trend especially after the placement of The Affordable Care Act. 

Do you have any questions? Contact our service professionals at Flagship Financial and schedule a consultation.