Long
Term Care
Long Term Care insurance is a unique plan designed to cover
the cost of health or personal care services because of the inability
to care for oneself. This may occur due to a chronic illness
or a disabling condition requiring care in your home or in a
long term care facility.
The
leading factors to the development of long term care insurance
are medical advancements and improvements
in drug therapies.
People are living longer but are still suffering the effect of
aging and the need for additional care. As the population ages,
the demand for care increases. There is also more likely a chance
that some of us will suffer from a chronic illness such as stroke
or Alzheimer’s disease and long-term care will be required.
The long-term care plan provides a monthly benefit to protect
against the erosion of personal assets and retirement savings.
The plan is flexible in that one can determine the amount of
benefit, the length of benefit payments and when the payments
begin.
The plan is guaranteed renewable. The contract provisions are
guaranteed. The company does reserve the right to increase or
decrease the premiums from time to time. However, they can only
do this in certain circumstances.
The qualification for the monthly payments is not dependent on
an inability to work, proof of reduction in income, or proof
of expenses incurred. Instead, the qualification is based on
an inability to perform two out of six activities of daily living
or a cognitive impairment. These activities of daily living known
as ADL’s are feeding, bathing, dressing, transferring,
toileting and countenance. Cognitive impairment is an additional
disability which would qualify an individual to receive long-term
care benefits.
|
