Facing Surgery? Here’s How to Prepare.
When advised to have surgery, how do you prepare? Do you need a second opinion? Is the surgery is really necessary? Based on recommendations, the best way to navigate a surgery recommendation is to ask a lot of questions.
Safe Care for Nursing Home Residents
Medicaid is the primary payer for nursing home care in the United States. In order to supplement state with federal funds to pay for nursing home care, states are required to provide a certain level of care to Medicaid beneficiaries. What happens to safe care for nursing home residents if problems arise?
Is that Nursing Home Debt Valid?
Is that nursing home debt valid? No patient’s admission or continued stay in a nursing home can be conditioned on a family or other guaranty of payment. Yet all too many nursing home “resident’s agreements”, those 30-50 pages thrust under the nose of a family member, ask for a signature as a “responsible party.”
Who Makes Your Medical Decisions? And How?
In Texas your agent under a Medical Power of Attorney speaks for you when you are unable to communicate. But what happens when you have not clearly communicated and, better yet, documented your preferences? Who makes your medical decisions? And how?
Bankruptcy Protections for Seniors Citizens
You never thought it would happen to you. But…..life happens. Maybe your daughter needed help with her student loans. Maybe your car needed one repair too many. Or maybe the medical bills just keeping piling up and you don’t see how you will ever get out from under them. You may be willing to go back to work, but just not able. What can you do? Will you be left penniless? Will you lose the house? What protections are available when filing bankruptcy?
Seniors and Medical Debt
Seniors often have debt because they are helping family members pay their debt, because they have needed house or auto repairs, or because they have medical bills. Read more for ways seniors can address medical debt.
Reverse Mortgages
Reverse mortgages get a bad rap. They are expensive and decrease, or eliminate, the equity remaining in the home. As stocks and bonds declined in the 2008 financial crisis, more retired people tapped into the equity in their homes. Will that happen again? Should you consider it? What are the alternatives?
Nursing Home Reform
During the pandemic 200,000 nursing home residents and staff, roughly 1/5th of the total (to date) died of covid-19. Many more died because of it. This showed all Americans what people who live in or work with nursing homes already knew: the financing, payment, oversight and treatment of staff all need reform.
Solo Seniors: Living Life to the Fullest
Some of us are solo seniors by choice. Many of us will become solo seniors by circumstance: spouses who predecease us, children who live far away or are so overburdened by commitments that they cannot do as much for us as they would like. Read more for ways solo seniors can live life to the fullest.
Replacing Lost Documents
“Four moves is as good as a fire.” Dad used to say. As we downsize or rightsize or face hurricanes or other natural disasters, we may find that important documents have gone missing. Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid has gathered information on how to replace them.
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