Medicare Doesn’t Cover Long Term Care

The most common misunderstanding about Medicare is that it provides coverage for the core of long term care like nursing homes, assisted living facilities, CCRCs and adult day care. The truth is this, Medicare will only cover your expenses when recovering from an injury or illness. Other than that, there’s nothing more. 

According to Medicare.gov, covers skilled care nursing facility for up to 100 days or until you recover. Only the first 20 days are covered and after that you need to shoulder everything. In addition to that, Medicare also covers short-term skilled care but only upon the advice of your doctor and as well as hospice care. 

Long term care is definitely expensive and can exhaust your nest egg if you don’t plan for this. You can consider buying long term care insurance coverage to cover your long term care expenses. It is a bit pricey too but if you purchase early, avail couple or group discounts and design a policy that is just right for you, then you can enjoy more affordable rates. 

Original Source: http://blogs.wsj.com/experts/2014/11/11/dont-count-on-medicare-for-all-your-long-term-care-costs/