Indiana gets $21 million over 5 years
for senior alternatives
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- The state has received a $21 million federal
grant to be used over the next five years to pay for home health care,
assisted living and other services needed by senior citizens moving out
of nursing homes, the state's human services chief said Friday.
The
South Bend Tribune | January 26, 2007
Full
Article
Bring home the promise of choice for nursing care
Our position: Indiana
should heed the success of other states and begin implementing its home-
and community-based nursing care law.
The
Indianapolis Star | April 17, 2005
It's a "motherhood and apple pie" issue to state officials and
a win-win in the eyes of advocates for the elderly and disabled.
It's also the
law, and has been for two years. The legislation signed by Gov. Frank
O'Bannon in 2003, passed without a single dissenting vote by the Indiana
General Assembly, mandates a "rebalancing" of long-term care
toward home- and community-based services and away from nursing homes.
Full
Article published
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Funding home health care a good investment for Indiana
Michiana point of view
The
South Bend Tribune | March 13, 2005
By JOHN BRODEN
Most of the budget options facing the state of Indiana this year involve
difficult choices of which programs to cut or eliminate. However, in one
instance, legislators can look to a rare, but enviable, win-win option
which will provide great savings to the state while providing more
popular health care choices and options for Hoosiers.
Full Article
Changing Medicaid
The Issue: Daniels says he may have to cut optional programs. Our View:
He should consider home health-care option.
(Evansville Courier & Press | Evansville, IN
| March 8, 2005)
Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels says the state may have to make drastic cuts
in Medicaid, the health- care program for disabled and low-income
Hoosiers, if the program is to stay afloat. Optional programs that the
state is not required by federal law to offer may have to go, he said.
That may happen, in part or in total. Yet, there is another option
available for cost-cutting, one that the governor need only reach out and
grab hold of. That is Indiana's
home health-care law, which was passed by the Legislature two years ago
but, for the most part, has not been implemented.
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Article published
at 
Senior Shuffle
Nursing homes seek balance between profit, capacity
Fort
Wayne News-Sentinel | March 8, 2005
By Jennifer L. Boenr
March 8, 2005
While one nursing home prepares to close its doors, a sister facility
just around the corner is expanding.
Courtland Health and Rehabilitation
Center, 3555 Spy
Run Extended, will close by summer. Currently, 62 people live at Courtland.
Full
Article published
at 
State can save money and serve people with home health care
Michiana point of view
The
South Bend Tribune | March 3, 2005
By WILL PHILLIPS
By spending 84 percent of the public dollars that provide long term care
for the elderly and physically disabled on nursing home care and only 16
percent of its public Medicaid and CHOICE program dollars on home and
community based care, Indiana has earned the distinction of being one of
the worst states in the nation in terms of providing a balanced and
responsive system of long term health care for its citizens.
Full
Article published
at 
How to find care outside the home
The
Indianapolis Star | February 27, 2005
By Shari Rudavsky
February 27, 2005
Few seniors want to live in a nursing home. But, for some, they provide a
needed level of care and the only safe option.
About one in 20 Americans older than 65 is in a nursing home, according
to government statistics.
Once a family reaches this point, next comes the arduous task of choosing
a facility. Here's what the experts say you should know.
Full
Article published
at
Facing the aging boom
Taking care of an elderly relative requires love, tact and planning.
The
Indianapolis Star | February 27, 2005
By Shari Rudavsky
February 27, 2005
Arthur Johnson didn't hesitate when his father died 21/2 years ago. The
62-year-old attorney and his wife, Penny, immediately invited his mother,
who could no longer care for herself, to move from her Muncie house into their own living
room.
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Article published
at
Patients have a choice
Logansport
Pharos-Tribune | February 23, 2005
By Kristi Osenbaugh
February 23, 2005
"People work hard all their lives and then they have to leave?
Changes need to be made to keep people in their homes."
Full
Article published
at 
Beyond the nursing home
Extending long-term care for low-income Hoosiers will be complex and
perhaps costly.
Fort
Wayne News-Sentinel | February 17, 2005
By Bob Caylor
February 17, 2005
In the long run, making more Hoosiers eligible for home health care will
be good for them and, perhaps, good for the state’s finances, too. That
wasn’t lost on state legislators; when Senate Enrolled Act 493 was passed
two years ago, not a single lawmaker voted against it at any point in
either the House or Senate.
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Article published
at
A shift to home-based care
Fort
Wayne Journal Gazette | February 15, 2005
If Gov. Mitch Daniels wants to cut Medicaid costs without a hue and cry
from the Hoosiers who depend on services, he need only insist that Senate
Enrolled Act 493 be implemented. The governor can’t lose: The state will
save money, and Hoosiers will be better served.
Full
Article published
at 
Indiana is urged to end reliance on nursing homes
The
Indianapolis Star | February 9, 2005
By Diana Penner
February 9, 2005
Two years after Indiana lawmakers voted to shift more people from nursing
homes to home- and community-based care, advocates for elderly and
disabled people Tuesday called on the state to implement that plan.
The state's failure to move forward with the intent of the legislation
passed in 2003 has meant "the wasteful expenditure of hundreds of
millions of Medicaid dollars," John Cardwell, director of The
Generations Project, said in a written statement.
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Article published
at
Generations Project Releases Study on State's Long Term Care
System
Inside
Indiana Business with Gerry Dick | February 8, 2005
(Indianapolis) Today, The Generations Project, a non-profit policy
education organization based in Indianapolis, released a major study of
Indiana’s publicly funded system of home and community based long term
care for senior citizens and persons with disabilities.
The study, completed with funding from The Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable
Trust, concludes that implementing a sweeping reform law passed by the
General Assembly in 2003 is a key to resolving the state’s Medicaid
funding and service delivery crisis.
Full
Article published
at 
Those needing health care aid face long waits
Fort
Wayne Journal Gazette | December 26, 2004
By Rick Farrant
Richard Mulroy had heart problems, prostate cancer and severe arthritis
when niece Brenda Tremoulet and husband Paul rescued him in April 2000
from a life of isolation in Denver.
Full
Article published
at
Seniors want alternatives to nursing homes
The
Seymour Tribune | October 20,2004
By Kyle Lowry
Emotions ran high Tuesday at the senior health forum to discuss
community-based and home health care at the Seymour Community Center.
“My daughter thinks I ought to be shipped off to a nursing home,” said
70-year-old Virginia Vincent of North Vernon.
“I think if you keep an older person in their own environment and keep
them active they’re more likely to be better off.”
Full
Article published
at 
Forum seeks answers for senior care
The
Seymour Tribune | October 15,2004
Three state and local agencies will spotlight community-based and home
health care during a forum in Seymour Tuesday afternoon.
Indiana Home Care Task Force, Aging and Community Services of South
Central Indiana and Seymour Community Service Council are sponsoring the
forum on Indiana’s new home and
community based health care law at 1 p.m. at Seymour Community
Center, 107 S. Chestnut St.
Full
Article published
at
Update on John Cutter
(As appeared in the Summer 2004 edition of the Citizens Action Coalition
of Indiana newsletter, Citizens Power | May 2004
The following article appeared in the Daily Reporter, Greenfield,
Indiana on July 3, 2003. Excerpts from the article have been reproduced
in Citizens Power with permission from the Daily Reporter.
Written by Mary Beth Wagner and Scott Slade, staff writers at the Greenfield paper, the article profiles John Cutter,
a Greenfield
area nursing home resident who died in early 2004. At the time of his
death, Mr. Cutter was on a waiting list for home and community based
services through the Indiana CHOICE program. He had hoped to take
advantage of provisions in recently-passed Senate Enrolled Act 493- which
would have allowed the Medicaid dollars providing him with nursing home
care to provide him with more appropriate home and community based care
options.
Full Article (pdf)
Indiana passes balancing
act in long-term care; Honor Society of Nursing lends support to public
awareness program
This article, published in the Second Quarter 2004 issue of Reflections on
Nursing Leadership, is posted with permission. Reflections on
Nursing Leadership is published by the Honor Society of Nursing,
Sigma Theta Tau International.
"We can't afford not to do this," was state Sen. Greg Server's
analysis of the choices faced by Indiana lawmakers in 2003 when
considering a bill that would help balance long-term-care funding between
institutional care and other types of home- and community-based care.
That bill became law in 2003 when the state's General Assembly passed
Senate Enrolled Act 493.
Full Article
(pdf)
Home Care for Seniors and Disabled in Jeopardy
Saving pennies while wasting millions, advocates charge Indiana breaks
its own law
The
Indianapolis Eye | Indianapolis, IN | December 22, 2003
The Indiana General Assembly did something visionary when it passed SEA
493, the Long-Term Care Services Act in 2003. The law provided a means
for funding home care rather than nursing home care, a change which
actually saves the state money. Now critics charge state agencies are
ignoring legal deadlines and withholding start-up funds needed to
jump-start the mandated — and ultimately cost neutral — reform.
Full
Article published
at 
Reawakening a sleeping giant --
State conference for people with disabilities rejuvenates ADA aim.
The
Times of Northwest Indiana | Munster, IN | December 8, 2003
Marca Bristo remembers breaking her neck 26 years ago and, because of her
wheelchair, being forced to ride in rat-infested cargo elevators to enter
museums and being all but prohibited from restaurants.
Full
Article published
at 
Senior care
options set to widen
The Daily
Reporter | Greenfield,
IN July 3, 2003
John Cutter is going home today to celebrate Independence day with his
family. The 74- year-old Greenfield
resident would like nothing more than to make permanent the four day
absence from the nursing home where he lives - a possibility made more
likely on Tuesday when Indiana
law SEA 493 took effect.
Full Article
The Generations Project: Creating Consensus to Reform Long Term
Health Care in Indiana
(As appeared in the Summer 2003 edition of the Citizens Action Coalition
of Indiana newsletter, Citizens Power | May 2003)
Citizens Action Coalition has had a major and consistent role in
reforming long term health care in Indiana since the mid 1980's when CAC
worked with many other organizations to pass the CHOICE home health care
program. Since December of 2001, CAC has increased its involvement in
long term health care reform through its involvement with The Generations
Project.
Full Article
State subsidizing empty nursing-home beds --
Governor,
agencies looking for ways to balance funding between nursing homes,
at-home care
The
Times of Northwest Indiana | Munster, IN | November, 2002
Indiana ranks near the top when it comes to its abundance of nursing-home
beds but near the bottom when it comes to filling them -- a cost of
millions of dollars to taxpayers.
Full
Article published
at
