Taking care of an elderly loved one is a monumental undertaking, and choosing a specific member of the family to act as representative, or bestowing on him or her the title of “Caregiver” is something that should not be taken lightly.

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

This way, you lessen the strain placed on yourself, your family, and, perhaps most importantly, the loved one for whom you are caring.
 

We all want to be independent. Everyone wants to be able to do things on their own. That’s the very definition of independence! Being able to accomplish a task, no matter how simple, without the aid of someone else brings good feelings—accomplishment and pride. And while independence is something that’s important to everyone, let us not forget that a sense of independence doesn’t have an age limit. It’s just as important to the elderly as it is to younger generations.

Getting older, however, often brings its own limitations into the picture, thereby hindering the goal of being independent—at least to the degree we or an elderly loved one wants to be. A lot of the time, seniors can live completely normal, independent lives. But there are some that may experience some issues such as decreased mobility or illness that can prove to be a stumbling block for them. If this is the case, then a caregiver may be just who they need to help them keep that sense of independence they once had and that which they now crave, even if it isn’t to the extent it once was.

Going hand in hand with that feeling of independence is that the elder be involved in his or her own care. Unless specifically stated otherwise, they should be allowed to do the things they are still capable of doing. Many older adults can still do things in daily life, like light chores (cleaning, cooking, or even grocery shopping), and all of these can be vital to providing them with and maintaining a sense of independence.

If you are considering becoming a caretaker for an elderly individual, you should know that besides performing normal household duties, you also need to be willing to participate in other activities with the senior, like playing games, going for walks, eating together or simply having a good conversation. It’s crucial that the elderly people living on their own be involved in caring for themselves, since that can work to instill a sense of purpose in life for them. That, in turn, will lead to that sense of accomplishment we mentioned before and helps to solidify that sense of stability and independence.

While some may not be able to quite reach that end goal of complete independence on their own, all is not lost. By having someone available to help in the areas they need it, that goal can become a part of their daily reality.

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

Home Health Care services are exactly what they sound like, but Home Health Care agencies do vary greatly when it comes the types of services they provide. And while home health care and home services do sound similar, home care is medically inclined. Let’s look at some of the medically-related tasks home health care helps with:

• Provides or assists with patient’s personal care, including but not limited to: bathing, shampoo hair, oral hygiene, and general skin care. Helps patients with dressing or grooming. All care is consistent with a “Plan of Care.”
• Helps patients or clients with mobility and ambulation, with consistency to Plan of Care. Such things might include transfers, assistance with walker use, etc.
• Prepares and serves meal, as needed. May also feed and/or give fluids as directed in Plan of Care.
• Helps patients with toileting activities, including, when appropriate: bedpan use, commode or toilet; or changing diapers. Takes and records oral, rectal and auxiliary temperatures, pulse and respiration, and/or blood pressure.
• Turns and positions those who are bed-bound, and provides preventative skin care techniques like back rubs and other measures.
• Performs a range of motion and other simple things as instructed by therapists or nurses.
• Helps patients and clients in the self-administration of medicines. Aides do not administer medicine but assist patients.
• Performs household tasks like changing sheets, washing dishes, vacuuming and dust mop floors, dusting furniture, grocery shopping, emptying trash, etc. as appropriate and outlined in Plan of Care.
• Reports observations in a timely manner to RN Case Manager, in order to get nursing attention to patient changes or other urgent needs, as well as documentation of observation and duties.
• Makes use of personal protective equipment when completing tasks where contact with blood or body fluids is possible. Involve patient is socialization or other types of diversionary activities to help with mod and self-esteem enhancement.

In the realm of Nursing Care, RN’s or LPNs give more advanced skilled care, like:

• Skilled Nursing evaluations
• Observation and assessment
• Catheter care
• Cardiac rehabilitation
• Congestive Heart Failure
• Pre & Post Heart Transplant
• Inotropic Home IV Therapy
• Tracheostomy Care
• Wound care and dressings
• Wound Vac Care
• Injections
• Physical Therapy
• Intravenous Therapy
• Tube feedings and care
• Ostomy care and teaching
• Diabetic care and teaching
• Disease process education
• Post stroke care
• Hypertension, congestive heart failure (CHF) and Emphysema (COPD) care
• Medication management
• Family Counseling and Teaching

And the following specialty services may be provided, dependent on the needs of the client and the resources of the agency:

• Medical Social Worker
• Physical Therapy
• Occupational Therapy
• Speech Therapy
• Hospice Care
• Chaplain Services

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

Going through the last stages of life with an elderly loved one is hard enough without also having to try and remember what papers you might need to have ready too. In this article, we’ll take a quick look at some of the documents that everyone should have, and we’ll also see in another article what will happen if you don’t have the necessary documents.

Let’s get started.

The documents that everyone should have include the following:

• Advanced Health Care Directive
• POLST (Physicians Orders for Life Sustaining Treatment)
• Will
• Power of Attorney for Finance
• Final Arrangements

Other things you might need are:

• Trusts
• Beneficiary forms

Now, let’s take a more in-depth look at each of these things, starting with the Advanced Health Care Directive.

Advanced Health Care Directive

What it does: An advanced health care directive allows someone to designate someone to make health care decisions for them if they are unable to speak for and do so themselves.

• It is created by combining a living will with a durable power of attorney for health care
• Versions of this form vary by state, but a form from one state will be recognized in another.
• Many doctor’s offices and hospitals will provide this form at your request.
• Those over 18 should have one
• It should be completed while competent, so you know what you are signing. It should not be signed if you have a mental disability such as dementia.
• It is often used to make decisions regarding feeding tubes, ventilators, or any other treatments for end of life or whenever someone is unconscious.
• It is only required to be witnessed; it does not need to be notarized.

POLST (Physicians Orders for Life Sustaining Treatment)

What it does: The acronym stands for Physicians Orders for Life Sustaining Treatment. It replaces a DNR—or Do Not Resuscitate—order.

• Lets those who have life-threatening illnesses to decide what treatment they do or do not want to receive. They do this with their doctor.
• This document can be helpful if you do not wish for emergency responders to perform CPR and also informs on other such treatments you may or may not want to receive.

Will

What it does: Outlines your wishes with regard to your estate (any money and belongings), and how you wish for those things to be dispersed to family, friends, organizations, and others after you pass away.

• Also known as a Last Will and Testament.
• Laws regarding estates often vary from state to state, but many of them will often honor those wills made out-of-state.
• An attorney for those estates over $100,000 isn’t required, but it’s a good idea to have one help you write the will or look over what you’ve already written with you.
• A will has to be completed while competent, so you know what you are signing. You cannot complete a will if you have a mental complication, such as dementia or Alzheimer’s.
• An executor or administrator can be named in a will, allow you to choose who will pay any final bills and carry out your final wishes.
• The probate court will oversee the executor in order to ensure that wishes are carried out as outlined in the will.

Durable Power of Attorney for Finance

What it does: Gives a person of your choice access to your finances, like a checking account, any investments, or property so that they can pay bills for you.

• Is valid even if you are incapacitated.
• Has to be completed while competent, so you know what you are signing.
• The person you name as power of attorney for finance must be someone you trust. If you don’t, you should talk with a professional.
• A spouse might not have access to all funds unless everything, even investments, is held as joint property.

Final Arrangements

What it does: This allows you to state what happens after you pass away—whether you want to be buried or cremated—and informs your family members. Also makes your wishes known regarding things like donation of organs or any other special arrangements you might have.

• Puts wishes in writing and consolidates them in a place that family members can easily locate them.
• The more decisions you make prior to death, that’s fewer that your family have to make during an incredibly difficult time.

Trusts

What it does: Creates a legal entity in which to hold your assets so that your estate can skip the probate process when you pass away.

• Also known as a living trust.
• A trustee can be named in order to care for the trust while you are alive and distribute items in the trust to any beneficiaries when you die.
• You are able to be the trustee while you are still alive, and are able to name a successor who will step in when you become incapacitated or die.
• A revocable trust lets you control everything happening with the trust while you are living.
• An irrevocable trust is unable to be changed without consent from the beneficiary.
• A variety of options are available for trusts to serve a specific purpose:
  • Special Needs Trust: Sets aside funding for the purpose of assisting one who is disabled.
  • Charitable Trust: Contains money to be given to charity.
  • Bypass Trust: An irrevocable trust that passes assets to spouse and then children when the second parent dies. This limits taxes on the estate.
  • Life Insurance Trust: Gets rid of life insurance from the estate, thus removing estate taxes.
  • Generation Skipping Trust: Lets grandchildren inherit assets directly without paying taxes.

Beneficiary Forms

Any bank accounts, investments, insurance, or retirement plans are able to be designated as “payable on death” to a beneficiary you name. This means that funds do not pass through the probate process, and allows for immediate access to funds.

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

 

When making the move to a long-term care facility, it can be quite difficult figuring out how to go about downsizing and actually making that move. Of course, there are necessities that the person will need as they make the transition from home to a care facility. It is a transition that can be scary for all involved, but especially the person moving. It would be a good idea to take some favorite pictures or a few small items that hold sentimental value for the person. That way, he or she can have some semblance of home in their new surroundings to make the move a little easier. If needed, perhaps another family member might be willing to look after some of the other things the person is unable to take with them. That way, those important items are with someone safe, and can be brought (and taken back) when the person comes for a visit.

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

It can be extremely difficult to learn that you are no longer able to do things that once came so easy to you. If you make the decision to give your loved one in-home care—whether your family does it themselves or employs the services of a professional, you can expect to come up against some opposition. After all, no one likes not being able to do even simple tasks on their own. If your loved one is normally quite friendly and quiet, this can often be surprising. Though, it’s important to remember that when it happens, the outburst is almost certainly the result of some other condition, like dementia.

In order to be able to handle outbursts and combativeness, you’ve got to git rid of whatever is causing the issue and prompting the behavior, but you can’t deal with the problem if you don’t know what it is. That’s why it’s also vital to be patient and listen, though if they are agitated or upset, that may prevent them from forming their thoughts and speaking properly.

When you’re talking to or dealing with someone who is being combative, you should do your best to appear non-threatening, so be sure to use a calm tone of voice and try to be aware of your body language. If you seem closed off to the problem at hand, you can inadvertently cause it to escalate. Your goal should be to help the person calm down and take their mind off of what’s bothering them. That involves not only paying attention to them, but yourself as well.

There are a number of ways to do this, such as removing distractions from the environment, using different types of calming therapies, like music or interaction with animals, or perhaps even exercise or modifying the diet. Always consult with the person’s doctor prior to making any changes in that regard.

Caring for a loved one or family member that is going through dementia is tough enough as it is without also piling combativeness on top of it too. However, remember that they aren’t acting out just to cause a problem, they’re suffering from something they cannot understand, and that’s just as scary for them as it is for you, if not more so. If you’re patient, kind, and you listen to them and pay attention to things they say and do, you can help to lighten that burden and ease the struggle.

Again, this is just as much a struggle for them as it is for you, but it’s one that you can overcome if you work together. Change won’t be instantaneous; it can and will take time, but the goal for everyone should be a happier, healthier, more productive life for the elder—which will let you have happiness and peace of mind as well, and that’s just as important.

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

No one wants to get old and not be able to perform even the easiest of tasks.  It can be hard on other family members too. That’s where setting up a family meeting can be a great help. It won’t be easy, but gathering together and discussing the situation at hand, as well as coming up with a game plan for handling certain situations will help ease the mental and emotional burden—not only of the loved one themselves, but of the family as a whole. Plus, a family meeting allows each person to know where the others stand and what their thoughts and feelings are on different situations, and it can diffuse any tension that might be brewing. It is also vital to include the elder themselves. If the topic of conversation is about them, they should be able to voice their own thoughts and feelings too, and they certainly have a right to do that.

All in all, a family meeting on the subject of an elderly loved one may not be the most optimistic thing to have, but having them in intervals can be very beneficial in the long-term–both for the elderly individual and the family unit as a whole.

 

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

One of the many things that the Elder Law professionals at Scott Counsel specialize in is the creation of what’s known as a Life Resource Plan. But what is a Life Resource Plan? Simply put, it works to define, organize, prioritize and mobilize every single aspect for care for a loved one. That means that they discover your needs, group them into categories, rank them by priority, and then carry out the plan to provide you with the best care possible. While each and every Life Resource Plan will be different, based on an individual’s unique needs, there are three areas in which all of them are the same:

• Making sure proper care is provided to the elder, whether at home or in a care center, in order to maintain the quality of life that he or she wants.
• Locating both public and private sources to help pay for long-term care while resolving any issues that were created by a high cost of care.
• And finally, it offers peace of mind that comes from the right choices are being made to make sure that those we love are safe and getting the proper care while managing to preserve family resources.

So, when do you enact such a plan? The perfect time is normally right after an event happens that leaves you worried or concerned for his or her well-being. Something like:

• They receive a diagnosis of cancer, Alzheimer’s disease or some other chronic illness or condition
• A catastrophic event, like a fall, mishap with medication, a fire, accident at home or a car wreck
• You’ve discovered your loved one has been wandering off, is malnourished, dehydrated or simply unable to care for him or herself because of functional limitations.
• A medical event, like a stroke, heart attack, or aneurysm
• Burnout of the primary caregiver

While it is possible to wait until the person has an immediate need for a Resource Plan, waiting that long can put everyone hat a disadvantage. Creating one prior to actually needing it benefits everyone in several ways:

• It helps to get your loved one the care that he or she needs right now, which can bring relief for caregivers.
• It gets you plugged into a network of community services and resources
• It increases the chances of your loved one being able to age at home, which can increase dignity and independence.
• It gets all legal and financial affairs in order.
• It enables the family to avoid asset protection crisis when your loved one makes the transition to long-term care outside the house.
• It helps to empower you with a support network that assists in dealing with every legal, healthcare and long-term care transition your loved one will face for the rest of their lives.

Life Resource Plans are often right for the following people:

• Senior individuals who are dealing with effects from aging, chronic illnesses such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, stroke, or dementia, or any disabilities from accidents or illness.
• Cognitively, emotionally, or developmentally disabled persons, regardless of age.
• Those people of any age who have been permanently disabled due to accident or illness.

Finally, let’s look at the benefits a Life Resource Plan provides:

• The senior or disabled loved one gets the proper care faster, as well as having as much independence as possible for as long as possible and the ability to age with dignity.
• Families receive help in getting the right care and resources, and guidance with legal, health care and long-term decisions as the senior’s condition progresses, and security due to the spouse and dependents being provided for.
• A Life Resource Plan provides reassurance that the elder will enjoy the best quality of life he or she can until the end.

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

 

We’ve all heard and probably made use of day care for children at some point in our lives, but something that is likely unfamiliar to us is the concept of Adult Day Care. It’s a real thing, and just like regular day care does for our children, Adult Day Care allows older adults in our lives to be looked after while we’re tending to some of the other important things in life needing our attention, like jobs.

By the simplest definition, Adult Day Care Centers are able to provide both care and companionship for older adults who might need help or supervision during the day. They can also provide a much-needed sense of relief to both family members and caregivers alike, by letting them work, handle personal affairs, or simply relax, all while still having the peace of mind that their loved one is being well taken care of. The goals these places strive to reach include delaying or preventing institutionalization by offering a type of alternative care, enhancing self-esteem and encouraging socialization. There are two types of day care as well—adult social day care and adult day health care. The former offers much in the way of social activities, meals, recreation and some health-related services. The latter, on the other hand, provides more intensive health, therapeutic, and social services to those who have serious medical conditions or who are at risk of needing nursing home care.

Some services can include the following, and participants do so on a scheduled basis:
• Counseling
• Education
• Evening care
• Exercise
• Health screening
• Meals
• Medical care
• Physical therapy
• Recreation
• Respite care
• Socialization
• Supervision
• Transportation
• Medical management

Most Adult Day Care Centers are open during normal business hours and may be a standalone operation or located within senior centers, nursing facilities, places of faith, hospitals, or schools. The staff might do such things as monitor medication, serve both hot meals and snacks, perform physical or occupational therapy, and arrange any social activities. They can also help to arrange for transportation to and from the center.

Keep in mind that not all states will license or regulate adult day care centers. There could be a lot of difference between centers; because of this, it’s important to learn as much as possible about each center near you. And if you can, visit the ones closest to you and talk with any staff or other families that use the centers to see if it is right for your situation. You might also wish to check whether your state has an adult day care association.

The costs for such services can range from as low as $25 to over $100 a day, but this depends on the types of services the facility offers, the type of reimbursement, and the geographic region. Since an adult day care isn’t usually covered by Medicare, you might be able to receive financial assistance through either a federal or state program (like Medicaid, Older Americans Act, or the Veteran’s Health Administration).

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.

Getting older brings with it a host of not only problems, but questions too. Where do I turn for help? How much is this going to cost? Who’s paying for it?
The truth is that there are laws in place that are called filial laws. They state that the adult children are responsible for the long-term care costs for their parents. Though, it should be noted that filial laws are quite rarely enforced. Nevertheless, let’s take a more in-depth look.

Filial Responsibility Laws

Over half the states in the country have what are called, “filial responsibility” laws. The rules set in place by these laws do not apply if someone qualifies for Medicare. In the event that the person does qualify, then Medicare will pay the bills. However, if the person cannot pay for care prior to getting help from Medicare, then the children might be required to pay, though many of them also take the adult child’s ability to pay into account as well.

The purpose of these laws is to lessen the burden the patient places on the state’s welfare system, and many allow long-term care providers to sue for payment, but still others also make failing to care for a parent a criminal offense.

However, as we said, oftentimes these filial laws are not enforced. This is simply because many elders who cannot pay for care on their own are able to get federal help through Medicaid, and federal law does not allow them to go after adult children. What’s more—many people who need help paying for nursing home care will often qualify for Medicaid, and it’s quite abnormal for someone to have a hefty bill prior to qualifying for Medicaid. Filial laws often don’t have any affect on families simply due to the fact there are so few opportunities to apply them.
In a number of states, all of the following things would need to hold true for a child to be held responsible for a parent’s cost of care:

• The parent got care in a state that has a filial responsibility law.
• The parent did not qualify for Medicaid when he or she was getting care.
• The parent does not have the money needed to pay the bill.
• The child has the money to pay the bill.
• The caregiver makes the choice to sue the child.

If you or someone you love needs assistance with Elder Care law issues, call 856-281-3131. Let us help ease your stress and give you a plan.