How Much Money Could Seniors Need to Spend on Healthcare Costs During Retirement?
By Barry Zimmer on June 13th, 2017 in Retirement Planning
Cincinnati Medicaid lawyers provide help to seniors in making sure they can afford medical care costs. Medical care can cost far more than many seniors realize, even if they are able to access Medicare to help subsidize the cost of their medical needs. If you don’t want medical care expenditures to derail your retirement security or prevent you from leaving a legacy, it is important to work with attorneys who can help you to qualify for Medicaid when you need benefits.
Zimmer Law Firm has helped many people to cover the costs of long-term care and other significant health expenses by qualifying for Medicaid benefits. Medicaid is a means-tested program, but if you plan in advance to protect assets in case you need coverage, you can ideally protect much of you wealth while still getting access to the care you need. To understand why qualifying for Medicaid could be so important to your financial security as a senior, consider this troubling data about the costs of care that many retirees will face.
Seniors May Need $350,000 for Care Costs
Employee Benefit Research Institute took a comprehensive look at the amount that seniors would ned to pay for the costs of healthcare during their golden years. The researchers assumed that seniors would be covered by Medicare and would pay for Medigap policies, and then determined what amount of money seniors would need to have in order to be reasonably certain their health expenses could be covered.
The amounts differed depending upon the situation of the seniors and the specific health issues that they might face. For most seniors, one of the biggest factors in the amount of money they would need to have saved related to prescription drug use. Prescription drug use can be very costly and there are coverage limitations with Medicare Part D that make it inescapable for seniors to spend money out-of-pocket on prescription medications.
Comparing different amounts of recommended savings for those with higher versus lower prescription use shows both what a dramatic impact drugs can have on a senior’s budget… and also how much seniors can expect to be forced to spend if they need any medications at all. For example, according to the EBRI research, a man must save $72,000 to have a 50 percent chance of covering his healthcare costs if he has median drug expenses. However, if his prescription drug use was in he 90th percentile, he would need to save $97,000 to have a 50 percent chance of covering healthcare costs.
Women, who often live longer than men, must save more than men. According to EBRI, a woman who has median prescription drug expenses would need to save $93,000 to have a 50 percent chance of paying her healthcare expenses while a woman with 90th percentile prescription drug use would need to save $124,000 to have a 50 percent chance of being able to pay for medical needs.
And for individuals or couples who want a 90 percent chance of being able to pay for their care, the costs as astronomical. A couple who are in the 90th percentile for prescription drug use would need to save around $350,000 for healthcare costs alone in order to have a 90 percent chance of actually being able to pay for their care.
Getting Help Covering Care Costs
These costs show why many seniors struggle to pay health expenditures— and they don’t even take into account nursing home or long term care costs which could cost thousands of dollars more each month.
When seniors face serious health issues, the high costs of care could force them to go through their life savings very quickly… especially if they do not have insurance that covers their costs (most nursing home care, for example, isn’t covered by private insurance at all).
Medicaid can help to keep costs down and can pay for services, including nursing home care, which Medicare won’t pay for. Unfortunately, if you don’t make a Medicaid plan, you won’t qualify for Medicaid until you have impoverished yourself— and you don’t want to do that if you can make a plan to protect assets and get covered more quickly.
Getting Help from Cincinnati Medicaid Lawyers
To find out how to make a Medicaid plan or about other techniques you can use in order to try to get your healthcare costs covered, you should contact Cincinnati Medicaid lawyers for help as soon as possible. Zimmer Law Firm will explain to you what types of plans are right for you and will guide you through the planning process. Give us a call at 513.721.1513 today to find out how we can help.