Nursing home Archives - Long Term Care Insurance Expert | Honey Leveen

How I Discovered My Fate – Part 1

September 9, 2019 by Honey Leveen Leave a Comment

In high school, I remember my social studies teacher telling us that we were going to have an aging crisis. There was going to be an enormous bulge of Baby Boomers with unprecedented long lifespans. With longer lifespans, they would have medical needs like we have never experienced before. She explained that we were not equipped to handle this crisis. Little did I know this was my earliest career call!

This thought lodged into the subconscious of my brain, resting dormant for many, many years.

About 20 years later, I got my insurance license. In the early days of my career, I was an agent for life, health and disability insurance. Looking back, I’m so grateful I took the time to build this fundamental knowledge of insurance products. It’s really helped me and my clients in my work in long term care insurance.

Great Advice

When I got my insurance license, my beloved Aunt Ruth, who I dearly miss, mentioned that she had bought a long term care insurance (LTCi) policy for herself. She described what it was and how it worked. And she recommended that I look into this new product. She suggested that adding it to my growing portfolio of insurance solutions could create even more options to help my clients. To my credit, I already learned that my aunt’s advice was usually correct and I began my research.

Back in those days, I actually had to go to the library to research long term care insurance. I was unable to find any information in the books, magazines or journals on the shelves. So I turned to the microfiche (Do you remember those whirring machines?) where I finally found a few articles about this fascinating new insurance coverage. I was immediately intrigued and smitten by the nascent LTCi industry! The need and the product made so much sense to me!

A Quick LTCi History Lesson

While LTCi had been around since the 1970s, it really didn’t get much attention until the late 1980s. Even then, very few insurance agents understood it or offered it to their clients.

As my social studies teacher predicted so many years ago, our advances in medicine and technology were helping people live much longer than expected. Which was great news. Except that we forgot to plan for housing and care for our aging population as they became unable to care for themselves.

Heeding the Siren Call

Since my time in the microfiche stacks, the call of LTCi kept tugging at me. It was a brand new product. Hardly anyone owned it yet. Few people had ever heard of it. I could see the obvious need for it.

The economics were clear: Increased LTC Demand + Scarce Caregiver Supply = High LTC Costs.

Thanks to my early work, I already understood how insurance protects assets and gives people more access to a variety of options. The world of LTCi became an obvious path for me. A perfect fit!

LTCi is a product I could believe in with total conviction. It was something that could make a transformative difference for people and their families.

I believed the world needed a long term care insurance (LTCi) specialist. So, in the late 1980s, I launched my solo LTCi practice. I knew that being a pioneer in this industry would have its challenges. But I also believed the journey would end up helping a great many people!

More LTCi History: My Journey Begins

Stay tuned for Part 2 of my story!

In the meantime, if you’d like to receive a free, no-obligation quote for your own LTCi policy, just click here.

The Distilled LTCi Facts

January 27, 2015 by Honey Leveen Leave a Comment

Big thanks to Margie Barrie, long-time colleague and friend, for the following insights that “sum it up” for long-term care insurance (LTCi). The information below came from an article Margie recently wrote for LifeHealthPRO.

1. 73 percent of claimants are receiving benefits outside of a nursing home:

49 percent: Home health care.
24 percent: Assisted living.
27 percent: Nursing home.

2. 21 percent of claims are expected to last five years or longer.

3. What are the odds of needing long term care?

58 percent of men ages 65 and over will need care, for an average of 2.2 years.
79 percent of women ages 65 and over will need care, for an average of 3.7 years.

4. Assisted living facility, average length of stay: 21 months.

5. The average premium for a stand-alone LTCI policy is $2,400. That’s 3 percent higher than it was a year ago.

6. 92.3 percent of buyers are buying policies with elimination period of 90 to 100 days.

For clients who want to dive deeper

6. Medicaid: $117,240 is the maximum amount of assets that the federal government will let a healthy spouse keep before the other spouse can be eligible for Medicaid long-term care benefits. (Many states set the cap at a lower level.)

7. Lapse rate for LTCI policies:

1 percent is the estimated lapse rate for stand-alone LTCI policies.
0.5 percent is the estimated lapse rate now being used by Genworth in its projections.

8. 4.5 years is the average length of time someone lives after being diagnosed with dementia.

9. Claims length:

42 percent of claims last less than one year.
Claims lasting less than year are usually for home health care and caused by falls.
The average length of claim that lasts more than a year is four years.

10. Claims: How much?

$7.5 billion of LTCI claims were paid in 2013.
Over $5.2 million was paid each business day.
273,000 people received benefits.

11. Claims: Who’s getting the benefits?

71 percent of the benefits dollars are paid to female claimants
51 percent of the benefits are paid to claimants with mental disorders, including dementia.

12. Claim records (from Genworth):

27 is the age of the youngest person to go on claim.
103 is the age of the oldest person to go on claim.
About 20 years is the length of the longest claim.
$1.3 million is the amount of benefits paid in connection with the biggest single claim.

13. Age of buyers:

24.7 percent are between the ages of 45 and 54.
54 percent are between the ages of 55 and 64.
57 is the average age of applicants.

14. In 2011 and 2012, 67 percent of nursing home residents were female.

15. The number of people using long-term care services:

15 million: The number of people in the United States using nursing homes, alternative residential care or home-care services for LTC needs in 2000.
27 million: The number of people in the United States who are projected to be using nursing homes, alternative residential care or home-care services for LTC needs by 2050.

16. Demographics:

40.2 million: The number of Americans ages 65 or older in 2010.
88.5 million: The projected number of Americans ages 65 or older in 2050.

17. Burden on unpaid caregivers:

80 percent of long-term care is provided by unpaid caregivers at home.
67 percent is the approximate percentage of unpaid caregivers who are female.
67 percent of the people who plan to have a loved one provide care, haven’t asked the loved one.

“Police Say Nursing Home Resident Killed 2 With Arm of Wheelchair”

April 26, 2014 by Honey Leveen Leave a Comment

The breaking news that immediately seized my eye on the front page of the April 23, 2014 Houston Chronicle was, “Police say nursing home resident killed 2 with arm of wheelchair.”

The murders took place at Lexington Place nursing facility.

This is an article I wrote about Lexington Place. I’ve been there a few times and have toured it. The article was published in an insurance trade magazine in August, 2011.

What’s interesting is that hardly anyone ever comments on my blogs or online articles. This had been the case with all the articles I wrote for this magazine, except for this one, which described a few aspects of life inside Lexington Place. This particular article motivated many peers from all over the country to comment, all in positive ways. They all thanked me for telling the story straight.

According to my source, almost all of Lexington Place’s residents were/are Medicaid recipients. That means that Lexington Place was/is in a particularly precarious situation. Medicaid reimburses at rates that are beneath what it actually costs to provide care for nursing home patients.

If you search this website for “nursing homes”, you’ll find much factual information on why nursing homes are suffering. Essentially, most Medicaid-funded nursing facilities are the red and continue to suffer funding cuts.

Here, I opine: there is something about money being in short supply that causes businesses to panic. Then fear sets in. Then dysfunctional management occurs. This is what I believe occurred at Lexington Place.

I believe Lexington Place admitted people it probably shouldn’t have, in hopes of keeping its census high. If funding gets cut, a volume approach is often the remedy, whether this makes sense in the big picture, or not.

I believe, based on information I was given by a trustworthy former employee there, that Lexington Place is also woefully understaffed. That is what I was told, that’s what I reported in my August, 2011 story.

My question remains: if people complained about the murderer’s violent tendencies, why was his behavior not dealt with in a more reasonable manner?

The murderer bludgeoned his victims with the arm of a wheelchair. I presume the deaths were not sudden, but rather, drawn out in a process involving screaming, for quite a while. Where were the caregivers?

I think the answer to the above question must be screaming similar to that of the murder victims is a normal occurrence at Lexington Place.

Request a Free, No-Obligation LTCi Quote

How I Discovered My Fate – Part 1

Great Advice

A Quick LTCi History Lesson

Heeding the Siren Call

More LTCi History: My Journey Begins

The Distilled LTCi Facts

For clients who want to dive deeper

“Police Say Nursing Home Resident Killed 2 With Arm of Wheelchair”

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