Key Reasons Not to Wait to Make a Medicaid Plan
By Barry Zimmer on February 20th, 2018 in Medicaid
Medicaid attorneys help you to create a plan to get covered by Ohio’s Medicaid program if you may need Medicaid to cover your costs of care in the future. Many people come to rely on Medicaid to pay for expensive care as they get older. In particular, you may need Medicaid to cover long-term care costs.
If you aren’t sure if you’ll need Medicaid, or if you think that qualifying for Medicaid coverage may be important, you should reach out to Zimmer Law Firm to find out what you options are. We can help you to determine the likelihood you’ll come to rely on Medicaid and can assist you in taking steps to ensure you’ll have Medicaid as a coverage option that is available to you when you need it.
There are many reasons why you should reach out to Medicaid attorneys as soon as possible, rather than waiting until you get older and potentially become ill. Here are a few key reasons why you should definitely not wait to make a Medicaid plan but should instead act sooner rather than later to get a plan in place.
You Never Know When You’ll Need Nursing Home Care or Long-Term Care
The biggest and most important reason why you should not wait to make a Medicaid plan is because there is no guarantee what will happen tomorrow.
Anyone, even someone who is currently young and healthy, could suffer a serious illness or become hurt in an accident. If the injuries or damage sustained due to the illness or accident are too severe for the victim to continue living alone independently, steps may need to be taken, such as moving the victim to a nursing care facility or having home healthcare aides or nurses visit the victim.
As soon as nursing home care or long-term care become necessary, a big financial problem can arise. Medicare won’t cover most nursing home care and Medicaid, which does usually pay for nursing home care, is available to you only if you can meet financial requirements for means-tested benefits. This means if you haven’t yet made a plan for Medicaid to cover you, you may be unable to get covered right away and may need to pay out-of-pocket for nursing home or long-term care until you have become poor enough to qualify for Medicaid.
Unfortunately, you cannot just give away your wealth at the time when you need medical care. Medicaid wants to prevent such abuses of its program and it does so by implementing a five-year lookback rule. If transactions were made within the five years before you need nursing home care, such as assets being given away or sold to family for far less than market value, these transactions could lead to Medicaid benefits being temporarily unavailable to you during a period of disqualification.
Because you don’t want to end up having to sell possessions or having to pay costly fees for care out of pocket, you should consider making a Medicaid plan as soon as you can so you’ll have the peace-of-mind of knowing most of your assets are protected if you need to qualify for Medicaid.
The Costs of Nursing Home and Long-Term Care Can Be very Expensive
Making a plan to cover costs of care is important because paying for either a nursing home or for long-term care at home can be extremely expensive. You want to ensure you can afford the care you need without having to spend your entire life savings. Since Medicare and most private insurers won’t cover costs unless you need skilled nursing care, you could end up spending thousands every month on routine care when you simply cannot live by yourself without help any longer. This can be avoided if you are able to get Medicaid to cover you as soon as you need care.
Getting Help from Medicaid Attorneys at Zimmer Law Firm
Zimmer Law Firm will work with you to make a Medicaid plan that is appropriate for your age and life circumstances. We can provide the personalized one-on-one advice you need to determine if now is the right time to make a Medicaid plan and we can help you to go through the Medicaid planning process.
To find out more about how Medicaid attorneys at our firm can help you, join us for a free seminar. You can also give us a call at 513.721.1513 at any time to get your Medicaid plan underway. Don’t wait until it is too late and you can no longer protect your assets while still ensuring you’re able to get the care you require.