TERRI ABELAR
CEO and Founder, Aging Solutions

Expert Help Caring for Aging Parents

February 1, 2010

I was impressed by Taylor Swift's response to her Grammy Award. She is quite young, but showed great forethought and maturity (and perhaps experience with older people) in her acceptance of the award. It seems unusual for someone her age to be able to think about being in her eighties and then even think about what she may be saying or doing at that age. I think that would be about 60 years from now-2070.

January 27, 2010

Stimulus funds to help with elder care may be on the way.....

When I speak to families who are doing their best to care for their older loved ones, there are two major factors that keep them up at night: The amount of time required to take very good care of their parent(s) and their ability to balance that with the rest of their life responsibilities. Then there is the monetary cost of taking very good care of elderly parents.



If they have to deal with only one of these issues at a time they are lucky. One of my clients has been caregiving for both parents for more than five years and has not been able to work the entire time. She has been living on her savings to do this. Most people cannot afford to quit working in order to become a caregiver.



The costs to care for someone in their own home, which most people want, may run $10,000 a month for 24/7 care through an employee-based homecare agency. The cost of assisted living,  depending on need, or a skilled nursing facility may be just as much, although usually a bit less. I don?t know too many people who have that kind of money, month in and month out, year after year, available for their parents, no matter how much they love them.





If a family wants professional and moral support, geriatric care managers (GCM) are a smart choice as long as you have the money to pay for their services. A good care manager will definitely help you sleep at night by reducing the worry and stress that comes with the day-to-day care for loved ones by shouldering these issues themselves. If a family can?t afford private on-going care management services they would be wise to arrange at least a consultation with an experienced GCM or eldercare consultant, of which there are many in the Bay Area.  They also need to become educated about the huge, complex systems they have to navigate, and look for benefits that may help pay for services for their loved ones.





Currently in California caregiver support services have been drastically cut and it is possible under the Schwarzenegger administration that they may be eliminated completely. President Obama?s recognition of this particular stress on middle-class families, until now virtually unnoticed, stands in stark contrast.



One lesson to be learned for baby boomers is that they should seriously consider long-term care insurance for their own aging future.

November 21, 2009

Greedy Son-Chapter 4-What happened to greedy son and his Mom?

In Chapter 3  our client had disappeared and I had notified all of the authorities and the respective attorneys of the son's actions and for 2 weeks pushed for a response. The facility itself recognized what was happening, but since the Ombudsman didn't act and law enforcement didn't act, nothing more happened. Her court appointed attorney responded a couple of weeks later, no one else did anything. 

The son had removed her from that facility and cleverly took her out of that county and placed her in another long term care facility where she died shortly thereafter. Cause of death was "Dementia", which she never had.

Did anything happen to Greedy Son? No, nothing, nada, ZIP. Well, wait a minute, he did finally get full access to his hard earned inheritance.

So, as discouraging as this story is, it shows what people can get away with when they're motivated. My client didn't have the benefit of a high profile like Mrs. Astor and her grandson, which would have we all know would have made a difference in the outcome. Our client more than likely would still be with us had her son not taken over. Sure, the son was the only child to our client and would have gotten the estate in the end, but that is irrelevant.

The importance of other people caring enough to take action on behalf of a vulnerable older person is CRITICAL. The system that exists to protect elders is broken and people like our client's son know it and use it to their advantage.

If something doesn't seem right-it probably isn't. Do the right thing and report concerns to authorities, other relatives and just about anyone that will listen and actually may help you do something about it.

November 21, 2009

Greedy Son-Chapter 3-What happened to the money?

Chapter 3

In Chapter 2 the greedy son had just submitted his accounting to the courts for their review. None of it made sense and there was still a lot of paper to get through and analyze. After several more months, the law enforcement chose not to prosecute the greedy son, so they started negotiating a settlement agreement.The point of the settlement agreement was to get the greedy son to agree to terms that would would not allow him to get involved in his mother's estate or financial matters.

You might think that by then would have been relieved that he wasn't going to jail and may have behaved himself, but that wasn't the case.

During this time we were helping mom with all her medical needs, paying her bills and trying to get all of her accounts back into her name and the Trust.

During a short period of time when we had to transfer his still competent mom to a skilled nursing home for rehabilitation for a couple of weeks the son started again. I had reason to believe that the son was trying to gain control of his mom's estate again so I asked our Nurse Care Manager to visit our client and specifically review her medical chart. When she did she found a copy of that original letter from the doctor (which had been deemed invalid two years prior by a Judge) in the chart (as submitted by the son) along with a new doctor's note that the son had requested new medication because his mother's Alzheimer's condition had been worsening. The doctor started her on new medication based on the letter and the son's request.The son also wrote up a letter to terminate our services and had his mom sign it, so that we no longer had the authority to act on her behalf.

I notified all authorities immediately and pushed everyone to intervene. Their response was pathetic. The facility itself recognized what was happening, but since the Ombudsman didn't act and the law enforcment  didn't act, nothing more happened. Then she disappeared....

Look for Chapter 4 tomorrow-What Happened to Greedy Son and His Mom?

November 21, 2009

Greedy Son-Chapter 2-Will he go to jail for doing bad things?

Chapter 2

In Chapter One our client was trying to move into a more appropriate living situation like assisted living. While taking our client to see a new apartment she confessed to me that every night she was in the Alzheimer's facility that she willed herself to die every night before she went to sleep. You need to understand that the type of people she was living with were in moderate to severe stages of Alzheimer's disease, which is why the facility was a secure unit. I couldn't blame her for wishing to die every night.

So our client was now living in a lovely apartment in an assisted living building and getting adjusted to her freedom and enjoying different activities. Her son had been restricted to only have limited involvement with his mom and was forbidden to handle her estate, etc.

Remember that law enforcement had an open investigation on the son. All the evidence was there to show what he had done. Even during my initial meeting with the son, he told me everything he had done and I had taken very good notes to support what he told me directly, so from a prosecution point it was really a matter of a paper trail.

Well, paper trail schmaper trail. The son refused to spend his time and money to obtain all the relevant documents, so his mother had to rely on law enforcement and pay for our time to get copies of this evidence. One might have thought that the son would have been pretty worried about going to jail and would cooperate fully. Not the case and the courts let it happen.

So, we spent months and months and months gathering the documents as did law enforcement. An analysis of the accounting still needed to be submitted by the son. It  was finally submitted and it was worthless. Hmm, so maybe the son was going to go to jail for doing bad things?

Stay tuned for Chapter 3

October 12, 2009

Financial elder abuse doesn't just happen to the Astors of the world

This past week showed us that people that take advantage of the elderly and their estates have consequences-sometimes. The fact that the convicted Mr. Anthony D. Marshall is 85 years old may seem shocking to some people, but not to professionals like myself that see this all the time. Greed isn't age limited in my experience. His conviction on  many counts of financial elder abuse of his mother Brooke Astor is a milestone for those fighting against elder abuse. The Elder Justice Coalition has been working on legislation for significant improvements of the current elder abuse infrastructure for years.

The good news is that the more visibility these cases get the better the chances are that more people will realize how common it is. And perhaps people will be more willing to speak up when they see things happening. Elder Abuse is a crime. Unfortunately, greed and the desire for money or things motivate people to do terrible things to their own parents or relatives. In a lot of cases people are so greedy that they can't wait for their parent to die and receive their inheritance, so they start stealing money while their parent is still alive.Take a look at this true story.

Greedy Son-Chapter 1

A son dumped his 89 year old competent mother into a secure (locked-down) Alzheimer's facility. He was an only child and had his doctor write a one paragraph letter falsely stating that his mom was incompetent, then had his adult daughter write a letter saying her grandma couldn't remember things.

Thankfully the CA Long-Term Care Ombudsman was notified that his mom was unhappy with her son not bringing her the things that she was requesting for herself such as make-up and clothing. Her son eventually went shopping at thrift stores for her clothes. Her estate was worth over a million dollars at the time.

The son continued to raise suspicions and law enforcement was brought in to look at the case.  It appeared that he may have helped himself  to  about $120,000 of her estate in the form of a loan to his business. A local estate planning attorney helped him do this.

Shortly after law enforcement executed a search warrant and went through his business, the son contacted me for help. They didn't seem to get the fact that they were perpetrators and I told them that our company would be happy to assist his mother, but not them.

The son continued to ask for my help and I repeated that we could only assist his mother as an advocate and about a month later we were in fact retained by his mother. Legal counsel, law enforcement and protective agencies became involved, as did the probate court. The son and wife were put on notice to behave while the DA's office continued their investigation and. 

The next thing to do was to help move mom out of the Alzheimer's facility and into assisted living where she would be free to come and  go. Our client asked her son to help her make that move so she wouldn't have to pay someone else to do it. After waiting a few months, and just a few days days before her 90th birthday, we took charge of the move because her son never seemed to get around to it.

Continued in Chapter 2

August 31, 2009

A New Federal Program-Cash for Appliances is coming to your neighborhood soon

If you?re looking for opportunities to save money for your parents (or yourself for that matter), keep an eye out for a little known program that may help you save a considerable amount of cash. The ?Cash for Appliances? program is supposed to be launching by the end of this year. The economic stimulus package approved by Congress earlier this year was a $300 million program offering rebates to buyers of more energy-efficient appliances and other products with the Energy Star label.

It looks like you?ll be able to buy new more energy efficient appliances and receive a rebate from your local energy service provider and from the federal program. So far, it sounds like states will run their own appliance rebate programs, and consumers may not need to take their appliances to a store in exchange for new ones. Consider that if you're going to need to buy a new washer for about $450 you may be able to reduce that with a rebate from the state and federal programs. Saving a total of $100 or more, may prompt people to buy a new washer now instead of next year.

The states are supposed to have their plans turned into the Department of Energy by October 15^th and the plan so far is to make the program available before Christmas. I?ll keep you posted so check back.

August 10, 2009

Get free health insurance counseling for your parents on Medicare or Senior HMO's

The Health Insurance Counseling and Advoacy Program provides an invaluable service to seniors who need to figure out their health insurance options once they qualify for Medicare. All of the HICAP information is objective -- not tainted by commission payments or kick-backs. All counselors are screened and trained to provide individual appointments to seniors in local communities.

 

HICAP holds a special place in my heart since I directed the first program for Riverside, San Bernardino, Inyo and Mono counties in the late 80's. It was exciting to be able to stand up for the rights of seniors and to empower them with knowledge that would otherwise have been nearly impossible for them to acquire in any understandable way. (That was before the Internet existed.)

 

You should consider reading more about HICAP and making an appointment with a counselor for you and your parent(s) to review any questions you may have about their coverage now, because the annual enrollment period will be here sooner than you know. They also have community education workshops that will help you learn about Medicare-related health insurance in addition to long-term care insurance. There is a program in every county in California.

 

HICAP is funded by penalties paid by insurance companies that violate laws. In California during the 80's a lot of unscrupulous sales tactics were seen involving sales to senior citizens. That prompted a call to action which eventually developed and implemented HICAP on a statewide basis.

 

So take advantage of an excellent resource for your parent(s) that doesn't cost you anything and can save you a lot of heartache when trying to understand the Medicare beneficiary's options for insurance.

August 7, 2009

Safety net for nursing home residents is reinforced by $1.6 million

On August 6th Governor Schwarzenegger signed Assembly Bill 392 into law. This bill will immediately restore $1.6 million for local Long-Term Care Ombudsman programs over the next year. It will help ensure protection from abuse and neglect of California's vulnerable and elderly residents of nursing care and assisted living facilities.

What is the Long-Term Care Ombudsman and what does it mean for you? Ombudsmen are individuals trained to advocate on behalf of residents living in nursing homes, assisted-living residences, and board and care homes. If you have a parent or relative living in any of these settings and you have problems with their care you can contact an Ombudsman to help resolve them, through the CA Long-Term Care Ombudsman website. The Ombudsman?s allegiance is to the elderly or disabled resident and their authority within the facilities they monitor is well-established. I?ve found them to be extremely helpful in most situations and their services are free.

Often, problems arise from bad communication among families, residents, staff and management; the Ombudsman can help bring everyone together for the benefit of the resident. Every facility should have the LTC Ombudsman contact information posted in a public space so that you or a resident can make a call for assistance.

Last year Gov. Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill for $3.8 million in LTC Ombudsman funding, about half their entire funding. Evidently a serious case of elder abuse occurred in northern California that prompted legislators to rally to support the Ombudsman program, leading to the enactment of AB 392.

Where is the money coming from if California?s budget is so depleted? The $1.6 million in funding comes from penalties paid by long-term care facilities. That means that this funding is not taken out of the state's general fund. In other words it doesn't take away funds from other programs or budgets--it pays for itself. Assemblyman Mike Feuer's press release will give you more details. You might even want to drop him an email thanking him for taking up the cause.

July 29, 2009

California Governor lands a Sucker Punch, so put on your gloves...

Although the budget was passed, Governor Schwarzenegger took advantage of his veto power and cut more programs yesterday. Clearly, services for the elderly and disabled were hit by a last minute Sucker Punch. I think that the nick name "Terminator" is fitting for now.

The last minute punch was not a surprise to me and many others that are serving our elder and disabled communities, but it just seems like torture at this point. The cuts will affect thousands of people that are of the most vulnerable in our communities and I know that people will suffer. The question continues to be how will those cuts translate to people's every day lives? 

The additional cuts are tied to the IHSS program, Linkages and other aging programs. Linkages is totally eliminated as are some other community based programs, but it is not all clear yet.

In an effort to be pro-active I would like to be able to help people understand how these cuts may change their lives and help them look for alternatives as soon as possible. At this moment I am still looking for the details that will go along with the cuts so that they are meaningful to you and your family. I'll be looking for that info and will post it as soon as I have it.