Patti's Blog - Advocate for Elders, People with Disabilities and Their Families

10 Surefire Ways To Make Enemies At A Nursing Home

Excerpt from: Huffington Post (click for full article)

 

The nurses, aides, activity directors and other long-term care facility employees spend a tremendous amount of time with your loved one. They are the ones who help shower, dress and feed residents who need assistance with these tasks. They provide entertainment and arrange for socialization. Most importantly they strive to promote the residents' overall well being by any means possible.

On occasion, however, there is friction between staff and family members. This is unfortunate because staff members typically become deeply attached and devoted to the residents for whom they care. Disagreements with the family cause distress for all involved.

Unfortunately, some people look down on the aides and other staff and think they are only there because they couldn't get better jobs. But most employees in long-term care facilities are there because they have chosen this as a profession of which they are proud and to which they are firmly dedicated.

The following list of things you should never do will help you avoid pitfalls that can occur when interacting with long-term care facility employees.

Automatic Sprinkler Systems Now Mandatory in Ontario’s Long-Term Care Facilities and Retirement Homes

Excerpt from: 570 News (click for full article)

 

Automatic sprinkler systems will be mandatory in long-term care facilities and retirement homes in the province.  The new regulations were announced Thursday morning but will not be implemented until January 1, 2014.  Currently only new facilities are required to have automatic systems.

Over one hundred facilities in Kitchener and 12 facilities in Waterloo will be impacted by the new provincial legislation.  Public Education Office with Waterloo Fire Rescue, John Percy tells 570 News that once the new regulations are implemented into the Ontario Fire Code, education for owners, operators and staff at facilities will start.

“There will be a little bit of an education and awareness process for each fire department across the province to work with their facilities to first make them aware of the changes…and then adopting that and then the implementation period will be the next one [step].”

Retiring with Debt? Join the Club.

Excerpt from: AARP (click for full article)

 

Paying off the mortgage before you head into the land of fixed-income living, otherwise known as retirement, is becoming an unattainable goal for a growing number of people.

A survey by the Securian Financial Group found that about half of 526 retirees polled in March carried mortgage debt into retirement. And it appears that even greater numbers of boomers will follow suit.

[Read: Fixing One Family's Finances]

The poll asked 495 pre-retirees ages 50 and older if they expected to carry mortgage debt into retirement; 67 percent said yes. In similar surveys by Securian in 2007 and 2009, just 30 percent of near retirees said the same.

Michelle Hall, a market research manager at Securian, called the latest findings troubling.

Dow 15,000 and the retirement crisis ahead

Excerpt from: Washington Post (click for full article)

 

The Dow’s cracked 15,000 and the S&P is at record highs, so it’s time to pop open the champagne and celebrate, right?

Well, absolutely, if you’ve got a bunch of money in the stock market.

Which means first you’d have to be an American with savings.

Which means you’re a rare American, indeed.

“Dow 15,000” is the perfect time to take stock of an unappreciated part of our national predicament. Yes, we face a jobs crisis, a schools crisis, an immigration crisis, an infrastructure crisis, an inequality crisis and a college affordability crisis (just to name some current favorites).

But the sleeper crisis, the Next Big Shoe To Drop, is the retirement crisis.

Long-term care in aging US: Not for me, poll says

Excerpt from: KWQC (click for full article)

 

We're in denial: Americans underestimate their chances of needing long-term care as they get older - and are taking few steps to get ready.

A new poll examined how people 40 and over are preparing for this difficult and often pricey reality of aging and found two-thirds say they've done little to no planning.

In fact, 3 in 10 would rather not think about getting older at all. Only a quarter predict it's very likely that they'll personally need help getting around or caring for themselves during their senior years, according to the poll by the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

That's a surprise considering the poll found more than half of the 40-plus crowd already have been caregivers for an impaired relative or friend - seeing from the other side the kind of assistance they, too, are likely to need later on.

"I didn't think I was old. I still don't think I'm old," explained retired schoolteacher Malinda Bowman, 60, of Laura, Ohio.

Retirement and health care: Concerns are off the charts

Excerpt from: USA Today (click for full article)

 

Many people nearing retirement don't have a good feeling about whether they have saved enough to make it through retirement.

Add to that worries about health care costs in retirement, and those concerns are off the chart. They should be.

"I've seen people pay as much as $5,000 to $15,000 a month for their medical care in retirement," says Katherine Dean, national director of wealth planning for Wells Fargo Private Bank.

According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute's annual survey, more than half of retirees surveyed this year are not confident that they have saved enough to pay their medical expenses during retirement.

3 Tips to Ending Retirees' Long-Term Care Fears

Excerpt from: The Street (click for full article)

 

The number of U.S. adults who aren't confident in their ability to fund a decent retirement is at the lowest level since 1990, the Washington, D.C-based Economic Research Benefits Institute says.

Of particular concern to baby boomers -- the U.S. demographic nearing its golden years -- is their ability to pay for health care. AsIn EBRI's 2013 Retirement Confidence Survey, released last month, says:

Confidence about other financial aspects of retirement reached record lows in 2013, continuing the decline from highs recorded in 2007. In particular, increases are seen in the percentage of workers not at all confident about their ability to pay for basic expenses (16%, up from 12% in 2011 but statistically equivalent to 13% in 2012). Larger concerns were medical expenses (cited by 29%, up from 24% in 2012), and long-term care expenses (39%, up from 34% in 2012).

The wild card in retirement planning: Health care

Excerpt from: North Bay Business Journal (click for full article)

 

A common financial planning “hot button” is worry over the cost of healthcare on a fixed income in retirement. While we cannot predict how much care a retiree will need or his/her actual life expectancy, health care risks can be mitigated by maintaining good health, understanding Medicare and by informed financial planning.

Not only is it difficult for retirees to predict healthcare needs, but a 2012 study by “Center for a Secure Retirement” shows there are gaps in retirees’ basic understanding of Medicare coverage and the associated cost, that result in financial surprises. Not surprisingly 80 percent of Americans surveyed were concerned about uncovered healthcare expenses and 74 percent about becoming ill (with Alzheimer’s topping the list). 

Strategies to Pump Up Your Lifetime Income

Excerpt from: Kiplinger (click for full article)

 

Retirees relying on a popular strategy for drawing money from their portfolios may find the well running dry far sooner than expected. It may be time for them to find a more reliable approach to tap their savings.

Many retirees and financial advisers use the "4% rule" to calculate how much to spend from a portfolio each year in retirement. The rule is simple: Retirees who spend 4% of their initial wealth from a balanced stock-and-bond portfolio, adjusting the dollar amount annually to keep pace with inflation, can be highly confident that their portfolio will survive 30 years.

The study is just the latest in a series of recent arguments against the 4% rule—and even against the very concept of a "safe" withdrawal rate. Such rules of thumb are fundamentally flawed, some critics say, because they seek to match a relatively volatile stock-and-bond portfolio with a spending amount that remains constant, in inflation-adjusted terms, year after year. Under such rules, moreover, there's no link between the annual spending amount and retirees' actual expenses. And a portfolio's chances of surviving a fixed 30-year period aren't all that relevant, some argue, because what retirees really want is a portfolio that lasts a lifetime—no matter how long or short that may be.

8 Financial Strategies for a Long Life

Excerpt from: U.S. News (click for full article)

 

Americans' continuing longevity gains may be the ultimate good news, bad news story of our time. The longer we live, ironically, the higher our stress levels rise concerning outliving our money, having good retirements and being able to afford long-term care expenses.

Our retirement savings are already inadequate. Health care costs continue to soar. And the major programs that help us afford our later years—Social Security and Medicare—face cuts to help balance the federal budget. No wonder retirement confidence surveys continue to find us largely depressed about our financial futures, even as stocks rally and the economic recovery appears to finally be picking up some steam.

For folks already at retirement age, life expectancies have continued to increase. A 65-year-old man is expected to live, on average, another 17.6 years. A 65-year-old woman would live, on average, another 20.3. In recent years, these figures have been rising by one or two tenths of a percent each year. It should be stressed that these are averages. The ranks of the "old old"—people age 85 and up—are soaring.

At the above link, there are eight strategies to help you enjoy your later years and take advantage of the medical and lifestyle changes that are helping us live longer and longer.