The Medicaid program which pays for nursing home costs and for care in the community is called MLTSS – Medicaid Long Term Services and Supports. An applicant has to meet the specific financial requirements for income and assets (resources). These financial limits get updated every year. Some numbers go up in January, and others in July.  This post reviews the numbers that are changing January 1, 2024, and why that matters to you.. “The Income Cap.”  The income cap is 3 times the federal SSI benefit rate. SSI is going up to $943/month on January 1. The income “cap” will be $2,829. Why ..read more

On this Veterans Day we want to express our appreciation for the selfless military service to our country that’s been provided by our  clients, their family members, their friends and acquaintances, as well as those veterans we don’t know personally. Every era in American history has had its unique and awful challenges. Our veterans took on burdens and responsibilities for the benefit of us all. We have many aged clients who served in the Korean Conflict, the Vietnam War and in World War II. Very often their spouses are struggling to care for them at home, with inadequate support services ..read more

The hot news recently, is that after a lengthy, expensive legal battle, a Michigan jury concluded that superstar music icon Aretha Franklin’s 2014 handwritten four pages of instructions were a valid “Will” and that it superseded her 2010 handwritten Will. Despite all her wealth and having four children, the “Queen of Soul” evidently didn’t bother to engage an attorney to prepare a formal Last Will and Testament for her. Instead, she opted to write it all out herself.     Can a handwritten document (called a “holographic will”) be valid in New Jersey?   Yes, as lon ..read more

The Public Health Emergency (PHE) due to the COVID-19 pandemic  that was declared as of March 12, 2020, is officially coming to an end on May 11, 2023. What does this mean for people who are enrolled in Medicaid?  Those who have been on Medicaid for the length of the pandemic without any interaction with their board of social services will now need to prove their eligibility once again to keep benefits. Many Seniors and disabled individuals who have Medicare for their primary insurance are also financially eligible for Medicaid, which pays for health care services not covered by Medi ..read more

If a Medicare beneficiary is discharged to a subacute skilled care facility after having been admitted to the hospital for three days or more, they can be eligible for up to 100 days of Medicare coverage (depending on medical need) for the treatment/skilled care received. Medicare covered 100% of the cost for the first twenty days and 80% of the cost for days 21-100. This period of time is referred to as “post hospital extended care services.”   Many patients in subacute facilities who started receiving post-hospital care often received no bill until weeks if not months after that ca ..read more

State Senator Joseph F. Vitale (D – Middlesex) and Sen. Robert W. Singer (R-Ocean), who are strong advocates for New Jersey’s senior citizens, have co-sponsored a new bill  to address  problems that keep occurring in certain of New Jersey’s nursing homes. In our elder law practice, we have encountered situations in which financial officers of nursing home corporations persuaded a resident to appoint them as Agent under Power of Attorney, even providing the document without benefit of counsel. They gained access to a resident’s bank account and withdrew the client’s funds without auth ..read more

Valentines’ Day is upon us and we’re surrounded by images of hearts and flowers. Even if a person doesn’t celebrate the day, it’s hard to miss the pink and red reminders that we should show our loved ones how much we care. One way to do this is to finally take care of those pesky legal matters that you keep shoving under the bed to wait for another day. In our practice we have a lot of clients who come in to set up their plans before there’s an actual crisis. We’ve also had a lot of clients who didn’t manage to take care of a legal matter and now must deal with it in the midst of an emergency ..read more

Many of our clients served in the military between 1953 and 1987. Some of them spent time at Camp LeJeune in North Carolina, became very sick,  and pursued claims at the Veterans Administration  for service-connected compensation over the years. We reported in October that now there is a new avenue for civil lawsuits to be brought to obtain possible compensation. On August 10, 2022, President Biden signed the Camp LeJeune Justice Act of 2022 into law, aimed at helping veterans who were exposed to toxins in the contaminated drinking water during their service. This ..read more

Readers of this blog are well aware that the Medicaid programs have strict income and resource limits. Maintaining eligibility is often vital to the well-being of the individual. This is especially true if the person is in a nursing home facility, because there’s usually no other insurance available to pay for that expensive care. What happens when the Medicaid recipient learns that they are about to receive an inheritance? A Medicaid recipient  may inherit from someone’s estate based on the Will or just based on state law requirements if there is no Will. The recipient might be named as ..read more

Each year, certain of the income and resource standards are adjusted for the means-tested Medicaid and SSI programs. If you are considering an application for SSI (Supplemental Security Income) or for Medicaid, or you’re helping someone to apply, you need to be familiar with the numbers. This post discusses the numbers that are going up on January 1, 2023. What’s MLTSS?  The MLTSS Medicaid program is the one that pays for nursing home care, assisted living or home health care in New Jersey for eligible individuals.  The 2023 SSI benefit rate will be $914 per month. The “income cap” l ..read more