Word Count: 432

Summary: Long term care can take on many forms, anything from the health care worker who comes to a client’s home once a week and helps out with cleaning and laundry all the way to round-the-clock care in a nursing home. All of us hope we will never need long term care, but the truth of the matter is more and more of us – especially older citizens – do need full or part-time help with some or all of our daily living activities. Through the state’s Medicaid program the Oregon Dep...

Keywords:

Long term care can take on many forms, anything from the health care worker who comes to a client’s home once a week and helps out with cleaning and laundry all the way to round-the-clock care in a nursing home. All of us hope we will never need long term care, but the truth of the matter is more and more of us – especially older citizens – do need full or part-time help with some or all of our daily living activities. Through the state’s Medicaid program the Oregon Department of Human Services determines which seniors are in need of assistance with Activities of Daily Living (ADL) and provides assistance based on a scale of 15 needs categories. However, qualifying for state assistance is not always possible and the choice of care facilities and types of care available through Medicaid are severely limited and may not be right for you even if you do qualify for assistance. The best choice for a healthy individual is to purchase affordable long term health care insurance from one of Oregon’s private health insurance companies – and the earlier in life one buys such care, the lower the monthly premiums are likely to be. In addition to age, your overall health and your current occupation can also affect the cost of long term care insurance. There are many so many variables that can come into play when designing a long term care insurance policy that it may pay to consult with an experienced insurance agent during the planning stage. For example, not only does the deductible you choose (also called an Elimination Period) play a large factor in determining your monthly premium, but the length of time the policy will make payments or the total dollar amount that the policy will provide, and the type of care that will be covered (in-home or round-the-clock nursing home care) all will be factors in your monthly premium cost – as well as several other factors. The need for long term health care is not something most of us like to think about, but the truth is, according to government statistics almost one half of all Oregon seniors aged 65 and older will need some form of long term assisted care. Without affordable long term care insurance many people here in Oregon who need long term assistance either will not be able to afford it, or they will be forced into a government program which may not be right for them. Finding affordable long term insurance is something that every person in Oregon over the age of 40 should make a priority.