What is Long Term Care?

If you are facing retirement, you are probably facing this question, “what is long term care?” Long term care is an issue that everyone will likely face. In order to deal with it properly, you must be equipped with a sound plan. It is a common need among seniors, but those in younger age brackets are not exempted from it.

If you think that your health insurance will cover for your long term care, then you are mistaken. Basically, your health insurance covers for your medical needs such as hospitalization, procedures, prescription drugs and preventive screenings. However, it doesn’t pay for your care requirements during your recovery from illness or injury.

Commonly, services that are needed in recuperation are those who are custodial in nature. This involves being given assistance in basic activities such as bathing, getting dressed, eating or what is called the Activities of Daily Living (ADL). Help in carrying out ADL is not just limited to the injured. Mostly, those who require this are not ill, but just old and frail.

“What is long term care? Do I need it even if I’m healthy?” These questions might have popped up in your mind each time the subject of long term care is brought up. Your health changes as you age and it gradually grows frail as years pass. Your health may be at its prime now, but in the years to come, are you completely sure that it will be the same? Can you honestly say that you will not need any assistance of some sort once you hit your 70s, 80s or even as early as you 60s? If you can say yes to this, then you can skip on the rest of this article.

Current figures show that 7 out of 10 individuals aging 65 and above will require long term care. Meanwhile, about 40% of the younger brackets between the ages of 18-64 will likely need care. Given these figures, all of us are likely to require long term care and it pays to plan for it.

The cost of long term care services are continually on the rise. In fact, rates are expected to grow two-folds or even more years from now. If you don’t plan for long term care, it can be a huge threat to your finances and assets. Of course you wouldn’t desire for that to happen because evidently, you worked hard for these things. Being unprepared can also mean a drastic lifestyle change not just for you, but for your loved ones too.

Knowing a great deal about long term care is the best way to start planning for it. The internet alone can offer you a lot of useful information as you go about creating a blueprint for this future need. More so, it also pays to ask around and ask experts in this area for you to further substantiate your plan.

So, what is long term care? It is a need that you will face in the future. It can either be a threat that can drastically change your life or simply a block along the way that you can easily overcome if you have a sound plan as your first line of defense.