LONG-TERM CARE AND LONG-TERM CARE INSURANCE

Long-term care is a range of services and support that you may need for your health or personal care over an extended period of time. Most long-term care is not medical care, but rather assistance with basic personal activities of everyday living like bathing, dressing, using the restroom, transferring from bed to chair, eating, or caring for incontinence or instrumental activities of daily living such as managing money, housework, or shopping for groceries, for example. Long-term care helps ease the burden of living with an illness such as Alzheimer’s Disease. You don’t have to be older to need long-term care, though; an accident or illness may cause a disability that requires you seek assistance.

What Is Long-Term Care Insurance?

Medicare only pays for long-term care if you require skilled services or rehabilitative care. Long-term care insurance may protect you if you need non-skilled assistance with activities of daily living. However, according to the American Association for Long-Term Care Insurance, only 10 million Americans have long-term-care insurance, which may reflect the high costs of the insurance. For more information about long-term care insurance, see these resources:

Should I Buy Long-Term Care Insurance?

The following articles may offer some guidance on whether buying long-term care insurance is right for you and what you may expect with premiums in the future.

Original post by the Center for Advancing Health. Updated by the GW Cancer Institute January 2016.