To understand long-term care, think of Christopher Reeve. He had one of the saddest stories: a wonderful actor, husband and father severed from a normal lifestyle in the prime of his life. Unable to move from the neck down, Reeve went on with his life. He directed films, emerged as a visible public figure and testified before Congress about the need for spinal injury research.
In one sense, Christopher Reeve was lucky he had money. One thing is for sure: his regular health insurance would not begin to cover the kind of daily care he needed over the last nine years of his life.
If you suffer an accident or stroke or need long-term care because you become old and frail, you may have to come up with as much as $70,000 or more per year for care today. Regular health insurance does not cover it. Nor does disability insurance.
Long-Term Care (LTC) is different from medical care. Typically, it is not provided by doctors and is not designed to cure you of an illness. Instead, it is the kind of help you need due to when you are not able to perform daily activities, such as eating, bathing and dressing yourself, or because of cognitive impairment.
Here is what experts are saying about the need for long-term care:
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Buying long-term care insurance is the best way to protect your retirement savings from astronomical bills.
- Kiplinger's Personal Finance, May 2006
- The biggest mistake individuals are making today is
failing to consider long-term care needs.
- Wall Street Journal, October 22, 2001
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70% of people over age 65 will need some long-term
care services at some point in their lives.
- America's Health Insurance Plans, September 2008
- By the
time today's 50-year-old reaches 85, it is estimated that the average cost of a
one-year stay in a long-term care facility will rise to over $330,325.
- MasterCare Solutions, January 2009
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Most health insurance, including disability income
insurance, does not cover long-term care. The same is true for Medicare and
Medicare supplement insurance.
- Private long-term care insurance: "To Buy or Not to Buy", United Seniors Health Cooperative
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2.4 years is the average stay today in a long-term
care nursing facility.
- US Business Wire, 2003
Long-term care is often needed to take care of the elderly, but many individuals also find that they need long-term care at some point in their working careers. In fact, more than 40% of the people receiving long-term care are between the ages of 18 and 64, working-age people who require care due to an accident or a disabling illness, such as a stroke or heart attack. - Long Term Care Chart Book, May 2000
