EndocrinologyNew Report Offers Policy Recommendations For Including Long-Term Care Services In Health Care Reform
The SCAN Foundation released a policy report by Georgetown University researchers presenting four distinct policy options for including long-term care support and services in health care reform. The report comes on the heels of a National Omnibus Survey on Long-Term Care released last week, also from The SCAN Foundation, showing that nearly 80 percent of Americans would be more likely to support a health care reform package that includes improved coverage for long-term care services.
The Georgetown report, entitled Long-Term Care in Health Care Reform: Policy Options to Improve Both, was developed by a team of highly regarded researchers including Harriet L. Komisar and Judy Feder from Georgetown University, Anne Tumlinson from Avalere Health, LLC, and Sheila Burke from Harvard University"s John F. Kennedy School of Government. The report, which builds upon the Georgetown long-term care policy research of 2007, explores how to improve access to long-term care for people of low-income and limited financial res and ways to strengthen long-term care protections for the broader population.
With Medicaid budgets soaring and nursing home and assisted living costs rising sharply over the past five years, home-based care costs have remained relatively flat. The policy options contained in this report offer ways to not only maintain the quality of life and independence for seniors and younger people with disabling conditions, but how to improve cost-effectiveness of health and long-term care services by improving coverage for long-term care services that can be provided at home rather than through more costly nursing home care, and by better coordinating the delivery of medical and long-term care services.
Just last week, the Obama Administration threw its support behind bipartisan efforts to include long-term care in a health reform package. The Senate package being developed now includes a provision of the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports Act (CLASS Act) that would create a voluntary insurance program offering a daily stipend to help Americans pay for basic long-term care services at home. The findings of both the National Omnibus Survey on Long-Term Care and the Georgetown policy report merit serious consideration as President Obama and policymakers in Washington D.C. aim to complete health care reform legislation by the end of this month.
"With recent polling data indicating widespread public support for long-term care reform, the options presented in the Georgetown report provide federal policymakers a succinct guidebook for enacting meaningful reform that will benefit the growing population of people aged 65 and older," said Dr. Bruce Chernof, President & CEO of The SCAN Foundation.
The following is a summary of the policy recommendations presented in the Georgetown policy report:
The first two options would improve long-term care for people with low incomes and limited financial res. These options would modernize Medicaid in important ways, tailoring services better to individual needs and using res more effectively.
The third and fourth options aim to strengthen long-term care protections for the broader population; one with better coordination of medical and long-term care for Medicare enrollees; the other by establishing insurance protection for people of all ages and incomes.
Proposals to Improve Long-Term Care in Medicaid
- Expand Medicaid support for home and community-based services
- Improve coordination of medical and long-term care for Medicare-Medicaid "dual eligibles"
Proposals to Improve Long-Term Care for the Broader Population
- Improve coordination of medical and long-term care for Medicare enrollees with chronic conditions
- Establish public insurance protection for long-term care for the broad population
"All four proposals could be enacted together. We selected proposals that we think make sense right now - they would enable more people to obtain the vital long-term care supports and services they need and at the same time enhance major health and economic policy goals by improving the health and well-being of American families and the cost-effectiveness of health care delivery," said Harriet L. Komisar, Georgetown University.
The SCAN Foundation