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Did You Know?
Here are a few facts about Medicaid long-term care and home help in Michigan:
Why everyone should pay attention to how Michigan spends long-term care money:
- Medicaid is the largest purchaser of nursing home and other long-term care services.
- Medicaid funds pay for most long-term care - and the only option offered to everyone who needs it, is nursing homes.
- At $62,000 per year (the average private pay cost of nursing home services in Michigan according to the 2004 GE Financial Services Report), too many people deplete their savings on care that could be delivered more efficiently at home.
- 43% of citizens say they are not confident in their ability to pay for nursing home care if they need it in the future (according to the Public Opinion Survey Long-Term Healthcare Services, 2-03, w.k. greene & associates, Royal Oak, MI).
- Until we create a public long-term care system based on choice, nursing homes will continue to cost taxpayers more and more money.
Economic Sense in Hard Economic Times:
- The average cost of a Medicaid nursing home bed is $120 a day, or $43,800 annually per person. In contrast, on average Home Help costs just $10 a day, or $3,600 annually per person.
- In 2004, Michigan will spend $1.6 billion on long-term care services-a whopping 77% of those funds poured into nursing homes-one of the highest percentages in the nation! HOW MICHIGAN SPENDS LONG-TERM CARE DOLLARS
What are the potential savings?
- Home Help supports individuals at a cost of between $3,600 and $12,000 annually.
- Over 30% of people in nursing homes have the same type of support needs as people who live at home with supports.
- If the estimated 12,000 people in nursing homes qualified for the highest amount of community support, they'd each cost less than $12,000 a year-compared to a nursing home's $43,800 (according to w.k. greene and associates).
What can Michigan do?
- Other states have decided to earmark a larger percentage of their LTC money for community options. LTC money to the community: Oregon-73%, Minnesota-53%, Colorado-54%, Michigan-23%.
Research indicates public support of rebalancing the system:
- If given the choice of where to reside while receiving long-term care, 77% of respondents would choose their own home while 2% would choose a nursing home.
