New law a boon to those caring for elderly parents
Las Vegas Sun, 4/25/10 - Letter to the Editor
The new health care law includes the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports Act (CLASS), which will improve all of our lives. It provides care for the elderly who want to stay at home. I wish it had been there when home assistance was financially impossible for our family and our mother had to go into a nursing home.
The program is provided through a payroll deduction. The younger you are when you begin the program, the less expensive it is, and it will provide services for you at home for as long as needed when you are elderly. It is not mandatory. Employees can opt out.
Many are now caring for elderly parents at home along with their other responsibilities. This is a difficult, exhausting undertaking. The alternative is to use up all savings and assets and, as in our case, experience worry and guilt at eventually being forced to move a parent to a place where she did not want to go.
Wealthy people are able to make the arrangements their parents want, and the very poor get assistance from Medicaid. For the huge number in between, the choices are all difficult, but CLASS will now provide the long-term care we all would like to have for as long as needed, at home.
Our family thanks Congress and the Obama administration for working so hard to get the health care bill passed and signed into law. We in Nevada salute Sen. Harry Reid for making health care reform happen that will help us all.
Read the whole article
New law a boon to those caring for elderly parents
Las Vegas Sun, 4/25/10 - Letter to the Editor
The new health care law includes the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports Act (CLASS), which will improve all of our lives. It provides care for the elderly who want to stay at home. I wish it had been there when home assistance was financially impossible for our family and our mother had to go into a nursing home.
The program is provided through a payroll deduction. The younger you are when you begin the program, the less expensive it is, and it will provide services for you at home for as long as needed when you are elderly. It is not mandatory. Employees can opt out.
Many are now caring for elderly parents at home along with their other responsibilities. This is a difficult, exhausting undertaking. The alternative is to use up all savings and assets and, as in our case, experience worry and guilt at eventually being forced to move a parent to a place where she did not want to go.
Wealthy people are able to make the arrangements their parents want, and the very poor get assistance from Medicaid. For the huge number in between, the choices are all difficult, but CLASS will now provide the long-term care we all would like to have for as long as needed, at home.
Our family thanks Congress and the Obama administration for working so hard to get the health care bill passed and signed into law. We in Nevada salute Sen. Harry Reid for making health care reform happen that will help us all.
Read the whole article
