AARP Endorses ‘Empowered at Home Act’

WASHINGTON — At the same time AAHomecare was on Capitol
Hill last week, so was the AARP.

The behemoth consumer group said it was pushing members of
Congress to get behind the “Empowered at Home Act” (H.R. 2688) sponsored
by Reps. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., and Diana DeGette, D-Colo., which
would provide incentives for states to expand access to home and
community-based services. AARP has also endorsed a bipartisan
companion bill in the Senate sponsored by Sens. John Kerry,
D-Mass., and Charles Grassley, R-Iowa.

According to the group, more than one million Americans are
living in nursing homes, but many would prefer to receive the
services they need in their own homes, where they would be more
comfortable and save the health care system money in the long
run.

“Unfortunately, many Americans who want to be cared for at home
can’t because of a costly institutional bias in Medicaid, which
pays for nearly two-thirds of the country’s nursing home
residents,” an AARP statement said. “While state Medicaid programs
are required to provide nursing home care, home and community-based
services that are often less expensive are optional, leaving them
first in line to be cut in a poor economy.

“AARP is working with members of Congress to end this bias that
forces too many Americans out of their homes and costs us all too
much.”

Research by AARP’s Public Policy Institute has found 89 percent
of people 50-plus want to remain in their homes as they age.
Greater access to home and community-based services, along with the
help of properly supported family caregivers, could make this goal
possible for hundreds of thousands of people who otherwise face
life in costly nursing homes, according to the group.

AARP estimates that on average, Medicaid can care for three
people with home and community-based services for the same cost as
one person in a nursing home.

More information is available in an AARP fact sheet.