Question about long term care

[rcrush]

About 6 months ago my mom died and my dad had to go live in a nursing home. He had a stroke a couple of years ago and from what I'm told he will not be able to live on his own. My dad is retired military and had all his medical care taken care of or thats what I assumed. I get a call today from the home and they said that Tricare and Medicare were running out and I would have to have $30,000 a year so he can live there. I was dumb enough to believe that retired military get medical care for life. My moms life insurance was $30,000 so thats enough to cover 1 year of the home I guess. I would have to sell the house and everything else to make sure he could get taken care of. But what happends when all that money runs out? They said he would pretty much have to be dirt poor to qualify for medicaid. So I guess that once all our savings is eaten away he can go on medicaid but theres got to be a better way. I mean I could probably swing it if my parents didnt have massive credit card debt that I was using their insurance money to pay off.

I'm just stunned because I had always thought that since my dad was retired Air Force that he would always have his medical care taken care of. Someone in General Discussion mentioned VA hospitals. I tried asking the people where my dad is staying about this but they dont seem to know anything.

[sinkingfeeling]

1. How long was your dad in the Air Force? Does he receive complete retirement? What rank did he reach

before retiring? Has he ever enrolled in the VA benefit system?

Start here to determine his eligibility: http://www.va.gov/healtheligibility/eligibility/DetermineEligibility.asp

[CarlFrank]

2. Long Term Care

Medicare will only pay for 100 days of nursing home care after a 3-day hospital stay. In other words, after each 3-day hospital stay, a person is eligible for 100 days of long term care (assuming that the care is medically necessary). I don't believe that TriCare will pay for nursing home room and board at all. After that, the long term care patient must pay the costs of the care. If there is no money, Medicaid will pay for an unlimited number of days and there can, by law, be no difference in the care received between a private pay patient and a Medicaid patient in the same facility. If your dad has no assets or is close to the end of them, then the long term care facility should apply for Medicaid for him. Remember that the only assets that count are his and his wives. Not yours.

[rcrush]

3. Thank you.

Thats pretty much what I've figured. I just dont like that fact that they require you to lose everything before your government will help you.