My 91 year old grandmother is living in an independent senior living facility but needs a higher level of care. She has a generous federal OPM1 pension and SS benefits totaling $4500 a month, but no assets. Her total income after medicare costs is about ~4000/month, and she's also paying down prior debts and life insurance, bringing her down further to about $3500. I applied for Medicaid for her and was immediately denied. Every nursing home costs $7000+/month, including the state-run facilities. How on earth am I supposed to get her into a higher level of care?
Edit: Her current income is $4500/month. Her expenses:
Rent: $2400/month
Medicare A/B and D: $400/month
Prescriptions: $200/month
Groceries/personal care: $200/month
Utilities (cable, phone): $85/month
Nursing care: $440/month right now (this is currently added onto her rent and could be increased to bring down her income - would that work to put her in medicaid range???)
Debts: $600/month (we had no idea about these until her dementia worsened - too late to do anything about them besides either pay or default)
Life insurance: $150/month
Net: $325
Medicaid limit in my state is $2300/month so despite her net income she did not qualify, unless we add $1000 in nursing costs and re-apply. (She really could use more nursing care.) Would that work?
Submitted September 12, 2019 at 08:16PM by HumanAward https://ift.tt/2NdX3Ny
