I have repeatedly been asked in recent weeks whether a move to a senior living community at this time is “safe.” My answer? No, it is not as safe as we would hope, given the prevalence and the uncertainties of the coronavirus, CoVID10. While reported nursing home deaths related to CoVID19 may be at times inflated or otherwise erroneous, we do know that at least 20,000 and possibly more than 40,000 senior Americans have died in nursing homes during the pandemic, as the sudden onslaught of CoVID19 left many providers and public leaders ill-prepared. Certainly, most senior living facilities are doing their very best to ensure the safety and health of their residents and staff, and are working diligently to follow official public health guidelines for disease prevention. At this time, however, heightened concerns about CoVID safety call for careful evaluation of each and every senior housing option, as some placements must continue out of sheer necessity.
While long-term care facilities are following standard public health guidelines to protect residents as much as possible from CoVID and other ailments, at this time each long-term care community is conducting new admissions a bit differently. Here are some varied examples I have encountered thus far:
1. My client is only 60 years old and has some very serious health issues that render her bedridden. I was hired to find short-term rehabilitation that could also keep her for long-term placement after a stay in a specialty hospital. This objective was a terrible challenge because of her age and her funds being rather limited. Many of the communities rejected her, I suspect because they held the perception that a Medicaid claim would be looming from this client within a short period of time as her limited funds dwindled. The rate of reimbursement for a Medicaid recipient is significantly lower than what a community would receive if a person were paying privately.