ElderWeb

A sampling of stories about the effects of the hurricane on the elderly and their caregivers includes the following:

An amazing blog by Joe Angelelli uses Google maps and satellite pictures to show the nursing homes in New Orleans that are under water. He has also compiled lists of nursing homes that are accepting the evacuated residents and the supplies that they need donated to help care for them.

The Alzheimers Daily News by Mark and Ellen Warner reports that Louisiana and Mississippi needs products for at least 3,000 seniors with Alzheimers, that due to the trauma of the hurricane a number of seniors who did not exhibit symptoms of dementia prior to the hurricane are now doing so, and that local associations are expected to see a huge increase in the number of caregivers requiring assistance. They provide information on how to get donations to the Alzheimers associations in that region.

St. Rita's nursing home in St. Bernard Parish lost 32 of 60 residents in the flood following Hurricane Katrina. For some reason, the nursing home was not evacuated. In a story posted September 7 in the New York Times, Gardiner Harris describes the horrific sight of the bodies of the elderly residents found after the waters receded. No one knows why they weren't evacuated, and the emergency services have no record that they called for help. The story illustrates the need for nursing homes to have rock-solid evacuation plans in place, and that families may want to follow up as a second line of defense to be sure the evacuations took place.

A September 8 article in Indy Star by Vicki Smith and Malcolm Ritter describes the ordeal of Bruce Barnes of New Orleans who tried to rescue 78-year-old blind father, his 75-year-old arthritic mother, and his 62-year-old aunt from an underpass in Metairie, Louisiana. He reported that he was unable to fight off the crowds of younger healthier people in order to get his parents on an evacuation bus, and had to watch bus after bus pass them by. When a bus designated for the elderly and disabled was finally sent, he and his aunt were not allowed to accompany his parents, and they didn't want to be split up. They eventually got picked up by a helicopter. The story illustrates the need for caregivers to plan ahead of time for how they will handle evacuation of their elderly relatives.

Many nursing home residents in New Orleans were evacuated to other nursing homes before or during the flooding after Hurricane Katrina. The Louisiana Nursing Home Association has created a database you can use to find where a nursing home resident was relocated to.

PRESS RELEASE

National Church Residences (NCR) and the American Association of Homes and Services for the Aging (AAHSA) launched a hotline today to assist low-income senior victims of Hurricane Katrina find transitional and permanent housing. Effective immediately, senior residents in need of affordable housing are urged to call (800) 401-3340 around the clock to be connected to housing resource professionals trained to evaluate and locate available affordable senior housing communities nationwide.

Early reports estimate that more than 3000 units of affordable senior housing were lost to Hurricane Katrina, resulting in the displacement of thousands of low-income seniors. NCR and AAHSA have pooled their resources to help low-income seniors relocate to NCR and AAHSA-sponsored affordable senior housing communities nationwide.

In a joint statement, Thomas W. Slemmer, NCR president and CEO, and Larry Minnix, AAHSA president and CEO, stated, 'œIt'™s our expectation that the combination of NCR'™s vast affordable senior housing portfolio and its extensive service coordination program, as well as AAHSA'™s expansive member housing network, will be significant resources toward helping low-income seniors who have been displaced by Hurricane Katrina to find both temporary and permanent housing at various locations across the country.'

National Church Residences is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1961, headquartered in Columbus, Ohio. NCR owns and/or manages 260+ senior and family-based communities in the United States and Puerto Rico, as well as five health care facilities in Ohio. NCR currently has 18 other properties in development throughout the country.

The members of the American Association of Homes and Services for the Aging (www.aahsa.org) serve two million people every day through mission-driven, not-for-profit organizations dedicated to providing the services people need, when they need them, in the place they call home. Our members offer the continuum of aging services: adult day services, home health, community services, senior housing, assisted living residences, continuing care retirement communities, and nursing homes. AAHSA's commitment is to create the future of aging services through quality people can trust.

CONTACT
Patrick Higgins (NCR)
614-273-3514
phiggins@ncr.org
Lauren Shaham (AAHSA)
202-508-1219
lshaham@ncr.org

The Department of Health and Hospitals is holding a meeting to receive input and recommendations toward developing a comprehensive strategy to provide more community-based services to people with disabilities and to those requiring long-term care. The meeting is set for Thursday, January 25 in Baton Rouge.

People with interests in elderly affairs, mental health, developmental disabilities/mental retardation, physical disabilities and substance abuse are invited to attend this planning meeting. According to Raymond Jetson, DHH's advisor for special populations, the meeting continues the department's commitment toward making more integrated community-based services a priority. "This is the first step in reaffirming our vision for meeting the future needs of people with disabilities and those who are aging," he said. "The reality is that the state's fiscal problems mean that we will continue to see the overall level of spending on health care decline. This fact reinforces our mission to seek more efficient and effective ways to provide care and services in community-based settings."

He said the department's working vision for the elderly and people with disabilities will be on the DHH website beginning January 25. For people without Internet access, libraries offer this service. Interested persons can also write to Jetson at P.O. Box 629, Baton Rouge, LA 70821-0629 and send him their comments and questions.

"I encourage people to review and comment on this statement," Jetson said. "The website will allow for people to provide input even if they do not attend the meeting. These comments will then be used to help us develop a comprehensive strategy to move forward."

The Louisiana Department of Transportation has posted an online directory of transportation services for the elderly. Users can look up services available by parish, and find addresses, phone numbers, and a description of the type of transportation services available.

Louisiana's Treasurer says state government could save as much as $90 million a year by negotiating lower prescription-drug prices for the poor and elderly. He said the state could pool its prescription-drug needs and demand the kind of drug discounts enjoyed by federal agencies, and that this approach might save between $30 million and $90 million in drug costs in the Medicaid health-care program for the poor funded in part by the state.

But Secretary of Health and Hospitals David Hood said the state considered making bulk drug purchases for Medicaid a few years ago but it wasn't cost-effective. Hood said Louisiana gets about $85 million a year in rebates from drug makers for medicines dispensed to Medicaid recipients and that the state would lose those rebates if it pursued Kennedy's idea, and that would wipe out other savings.

The president-elect of the Louisiana Pharmacists Association, Allen Cassidy, said his organization probably would support Kennedy's idea as long as patients could buy medicines at regular drug stores, but his group wouldn't want to see a mail-order program. One problem with Kennedy's idea is that many pharmacies, including many of the larger chains, don't purchase drugs directly from manufacturers. They buy drugs from wholesalers, so it's not clear how discounts would filter from manufacturers to retail purchasers.

Kennedy said he doesn't know the details of how his proposal would work, but he is confident some savings would trickle down. The treasurer said similar efforts are under way in at least 10 states.

Kennedy said Louisiana has seen a tremendous increase in what it pays for prescription drugs through the Medicaid health-care program for the poor. The total has gone from $80 million in 1989 to $370 million this year, he said. If costs continue to increase at the same rate, costs could hit $800 million a year within the next five years.

The Louisiana Department of Health and Human Services has announced emergency cuts in the reimbursement it will pay healthcare providers for services provided to Medicaid recipients. Included in these cuts is a cut in reimbursement for nursing home care of 7%. Other cuts have been made in reimbursement for home health services, durable medical equipment, and outpatient therapy. The state also issued a press release stating that cuts in nursing home reimbursement were necessary because 23-25% of the Medicaid budget goes to services provided to nursing home residents.

Providers in the state asserted that these cuts will greatly impact access to care and the scope and quality of the services delivered. Three hospital and nursing providers filed for relief in federal court, and a temporary restraining order was issued to prevent the state from implementing the cuts. The state responded to this suit by stating that the only way they could avoid cutting reimbursement to providers was to reduce or eliminate some programs now offered to Medicaid recipients.