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Elderly's coverage woes
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December 14, 2000: 7:26 a.m. ET
Most long-term policies don't provide coverage for round-the-clock home care
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - While long-term care policies provide basic coverage, they don't necessarily provide 24-hour home care benefits. Also, if you're traveling out of the country, look into travel insurance that pays for medical treatment overseas.
If you have a question about insurance, here's your chance to find out the facts from a group of industry experts at the Consumer Federation of America (CFA) and California Health Advocates (CHA).
Check back each week to read the latest Q&A on our Insurance page and send your insurance questions to insurance@cnnfn.com. Don't forget to include your name and home town and keep in mind, not all questions can be answered. (Note that the information you supply may be used in a story on CNNfn.com and affiliated sites.)
This week's answers come from Bonnie Burns of the CHA.
Question: My mom is of advancing age and I would like to know where I can buy a supplemental policy to provide round the clock care if she needs it in later years. Her medical plan through the California State Teachers Plan has daily limits on amount and hours. Your suggestions would be a place to start.
Answer: The only kind of insurance that pays for the kind of care your mother may need is called long-term care insurance. Most policies, although they may provide home care benefits, are not designed to pay for 24-hour day care at home. However, benefits are usually paid for nursing home care, or in some cases assisted living. Unfortunately, once someone is very old, or needs this kind of care they are ineligible to buy this type of insurance. If your mother is still healthy, some companies may consider selling her a policy, but premiums may be prohibitively expensive because of her advanced age.
Contact the free insurance counseling program for seniors in your state to get more information about this type of insurance. You can find the 800-phone number for the program in your state in the back of The Guide to Health Insurance for People on Medicare published by the federal Health Care Financing Administration.
Question: Would you recommend that a Medigap policy that one purchases be a policy that is issued age or attained age one?
Answer: In general, no. Attained age premiums are often lowest at age 65 and increase as a person ages, often costing more at older ages than policies that are community rated and charge everyone the same price. As long as you are healthy you can switch to a lower cost policy when those attained age premiums get too expensive. However, once you develop health conditions companies selling these lower priced policies can refuse to accept you because of one or more pre-existing conditions.
Question: I am on Medicare and with an HMO. I will be traveling to the Near East for two months. I am interested to know what sort of insurances I should carry to cover myself and where I can get the best rates.
Answer: You need travel insurance that will pay for medical care in a foreign country. Make sure that whatever you buy has ample benefits for the same kind of medical services that you would get in this country if you become ill. Many travel policies are thinly disguised accident policies, or have stiff requirements and only pay for serious emergency care.
Question: I hear all the news on the need for LTC insurance but for one years premium on a LTC policy, an attorney can create an irrevocable trust to put all your assets in and then let Medicaid pay for the long term care. My taxes paid for use of Medicaid, so why shouldn't I use what I paid for?
Answer: This is a questions of ethics and personal responsibility. The Medicaid program is society's way of caring for those who cannot pay for their own care, not those who won't. It is true that you can protect assets in a number of ways and force the taxpayers to pay for your care. Just because someone has reached 65 is no reason to expect the taxpayers to pick up the tab for the care you need when you have the money to pay for it yourself. Most people pay for insurance to protect their assets and hope they never have to use it, such as fire insurance on their house, medical insurance, and auto insurance to name a few.
While long-term care insurance may not be the answer for some, maybe even many people, there are other ways to be responsible for the cost of your own care. Those who are already poor or who become poor paying for their own care or that of a family member are rightly entitled to take advantage of the generosity of this tax supported program. 
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