Is Life Care Planning Right for You?
It may be if you value these things.
Control
The elder care journey is filled with twists and turns. It’s normal to feel powerless because no one can predict how a loved one’s condition will progress. If your goal is to have more control during the journey and to be able to respond with confidence no matter how your loved one’s condition changes, Life Care Planning is for you.
Time
Finding, coordinating, and monitoring the services required to meet a loved one’s basic needs can be a full-time job, leaving little or no time to attend to details that can enhance quality of life. When your loved one has a Life Care Plan, you’ll notice the pressure easing. You will be the decision-maker while your elder care coordinator serves as the general manager of the team of providers dedicated to making your loved one’s life safe and his or her surroundings comfortable and familiar. You stay intimately involved, yet you’re free from the day-to-day burdens. This gives you more quality time with your loved one, plus more time to spend in your roles as parent, grandparent, child, friend, employee, and spouse.
Keeping Your Loved One at Home for as Long As Possible
Creating a Life Care Plan for your loved one shortly after a trigger event or diagnosis increases the odds that your loved one will be able to live at home longer. When care and services are in place early, the need for long-term care outside the home can often be avoided.
Help Making Residential Decisions
If the time comes when living at home is no longer an option, your elder care coordinator and our legal team work together to identify long-term care options and evaluate the financial implications of each option to help you avoid costly mistakes. Your elder care coordinator then assists you with every aspect of your loved one’s transition into the long-term care facility.
Family Harmony
A Life Care Plan sets the stage for open communication between family members. This is vital, especially if relationships are strained or relatives live far away. Your elder care coordinator serves as a liaison for family decision making, obtaining accurate and detailed information from health care providers, and communicating it to the entire family. This reduces misunderstandings and helps you sidestep discord. Your elder care coordinator will facilitate those difficult conversations, helping you reach consensus when opinions are divided.
Making Better Decisions
A reactive approach to care can be extremely costly. Families navigating the long-term care journey on their own often find themselves scrambling from one crisis to the next. It’s a crisis a week for some families. And whenever you’re forced to arrange care and services at the last minute, you’ll always pay a premium. When you have a Life Care Plan, there’s no more crisis du jour. There’s no more last-minute rush. You’re prepared. You have guidance. You have more options, a better understanding of the implications of those options, and the opportunity to preserve more of the loved one’s estate.
Preserving the Fruits of Your Loved One’s Lifetime of Hard Work
With long-term care costs ranging from $40,000-$80,000 per year for assisted living facilities to $150,000 per year for 24-hour in-home care—and up to $90,000 per year for nursing facilities, it has never been more important to plan carefully for the funding of a loved one’s care. Since no one can predict how many years long-term care will be needed, a Life Care Plan may be the single most important step you can take to avoid the multiplier effect of costly bad decisions. With so much at stake, even the most financially secure families find that the relatively small investment in a Life Care Plan pays for itself many times over during a loved one’s long-term care journey.
Doing Your Best for Your Loved One
Doing your best doesn’t have to mean doing it alone. Doing your best means being surrounding yourself with the right support, namely people who know what they’re doing. That’s what a Life Care Plan gives you. It takes the doubt and confusion out of elder care. As your loved one’s condition progresses, you have a team of skilled and compassionate advisors at your side. No matter what happens, they’ll help you assess the situation, evaluate the financial implications of various solutions, and then help you choose the next right move.
The Help You Need. It’s All Right Here.
Imagine greater skill planning for future needs. Imagine avoiding costly bad decisions. Imagine saving more of the money your loved one worked so hard to accumulate. Imagine the relief that you’re doing right by your loved one—and you don’t have to do it alone.
​
Contact Truhlsen Elder Care Law of Nebraska to get started on a Life Care Plan for your loved one. Call 402.426.8877 to schedule your confidential consultation.