Caregiving for Loved Ones

Very often family becomes the fulltime caregiver for their loved ones. They put their weekends, marriages, careers, or even entire lives on hold to take up this burden of love. It is admirable but often a difficult and can be an exhausting journey.

More than likely at some point the level of care will be too much for you as caregiver and you may want to apply for Medicaid to provide this care for your loved one. There are rules which say if you have cared for someone other than a spouse for two years, while living together in their house then either the house you share (if you are that person’s child), or roughly $370,000 can be given to you without it impacting Medicaid eligibility. However, whether the person provided the required level of care will need to be verified when applying for Medicaid.

The person in need of care must need help with at least three of the following Activities of Daily Living: bathing, dressing, toileting, transferring, for example getting in and out of a chair or bed, or feeding themself when food is provided. This does not include shopping, bill pay, household chores, and so on. Or the person might be considered a safety risk which generally means they cannot be left alone for extended periods of time. This must be verified with medical notes from their doctors that were created during the time the caregiver did the work.

So, if you are living with another person and providing them with care without getting paid for it, make sure every time you go to any of their doctors it is noted in the record that you have been helping, and specifically which of the above activities of daily living you are helping with. You do not have to be alone in helping with care, but to meet the test the caregiver must have been the primary person providing the care while living in the house of the one needing care.

So, what happens when you are sharing the work with others? For example, two kids taking shifts at their parents’ home and splitting the work 50/50 would not meet this test. But in that case the parents could pay them for the work. You must put a contract in place, or the state will question whether this arrangement was legitimate. Currently the State is only allowing family members to be paid at the CT state minimum wage. This is not about making money as much as it is about moving the money from the parents, who must spenddown if they are ever going to get Medicaid, over to the caregiver who is likely a child just trying to hold the money safely so it can be used for the parents’ bills in future.

Once the assets are “spent down” and the individual meets the level of care, they could go on Medicaid. Perhaps they get the program to pay for an agency to come to the home, or perhaps they have Medicaid pay a tax free stipend to their loved one so they can keep acting as caregiver, as well as provide thirteen hours of respite care from an agency per week to give you a rest. Either way, this alleviates the difficulties of going it alone, and waiting until the assets run out.

Attorney Halley C. Allaire is principal in the law firm of Allaire Elder Law, a member of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, Inc., with an office at 271 Farmington Avenue, Bristol, (860) 259-1500, or on the web at www.allaireelderlaw.com. If you have a question, send a note to Attorney Halley C. Allaire and your question may be discussed in a future column.