subject: What If You Could Get VA Financial Assistance For Elder Care Services? [print this page] What If You Could Get VA Financial Assistance For Elder Care Services?
Her illness drained their lifetime savings and the stress of the loss of his beloved wife and caring for her long illness has taken its toll on Jim.
Jim just wasn't himself anymore. He rarely ventured out of his house and stopped going to his weekly card game with the guys. Jim's hygiene and eating habits were rapidly declining and he stopped taking care of the housekeeping.
One day the postal delivery person noticed that Jim's mail was stacking up in the mailbox and knocked on the door. He inquired with Jim's neighbors if they had seen him lately. They said his daughter was in town last week and saw her take him to dinner and his son hadn't been over since then.
The neighbors figured he had gone to stay with his daughter for awhile since she lived out of town.
A couple of days passed when the son, who had been traveling for business, stopped by and found his father collapsed in the bathroom. Jim had slipped and fallen trying to take a shower.
Jim had not broken anything but had a couple of bad bruises and was dehydrated. After a couple of days stay in the hospital the doctor told Jim's son and daughter that he could not live at home alone anymore.
Now the son was divorced and constantly traveling and the daughter lived out of town with 3 small children under the age of 8 and worked the night shift.
They discussed home care with the social worker but she advised them that Jim needed 24 hour care and that would become very expensive. Complicating the situation was that Jim did not want anyone living with him and he did not want to leave the home he and his wife had lived their entire life.
The son and daughter looked into round-the-clock care without a live-in care giver and gasped at the cost.
They then looked into assisted living facilities, but again the $100 per day cost was greater than Jim could afford since he was only getting $1,600 per month from Social Security. His life savings had been wiped out by Betty's extended illness. But, he still had enough to disqualify him for medicaid assistance.
The son, because of his divorce, and the daughter, because of her child rearing costs, could not afford to help their dad.
The son felt overwhelmed and stopped at the neighborhood bar for a beer and burger while he pondered what to do. The son had served in the Army just like all of the men in his family. In fact, his father had served during the Korean war as a cook at Ft. Dix.
He lamented his story to his old school buddy who was the bartender at the bar. Another fellow at the bar overheard the conversation and asked him if his dad had applied for financial assistance from the VA since his dad had served during a time of war.
The conversation ensued and the son learned about a VAbenefit that he had never heard about. In fact, no one from the social worker to the local county VA office had mentioned this benefit to him.
His father could get up to $1,644 each month in financial assistance from the VA.
What a relief! Now his father could afford to live in an assisted living facility and get the care he needed.
This "best kept secret benefit" is a non-service connected disability pension benefit with aid and attendance entitlement. It is more commonly referred to as the VAAid and Attendance Benefit.
And, from the 5 qualifying criteria the son had learned about that day he had a beer and a burger at the bar it sure sounded like his dad would be eligible. The son grabbed the VAForm 21-526a, c and d along with the VAForm 21-8416 and got to work with his sister and dad.
They quickly discovered they had just entered the scary world of the VA government bureaucracy!
Greg Cook through his Aid and Attendance Veterans Benefits Handbook has helped thousands of elderly veterans and their widowed surviving spouse. To learn how break the secret code of this best kept VA secret visit the Veterans Care Advisors website at http://www.VeteransCareAdvisors.com
You too can be on the way to fully understanding the ins and outs of qualifying for this benefit and the best ways to document your eligibility for a properly formatted and documented claim application. Get started today to fully understanding how to get this VA Financial Assistance Benefit.
