Right now I have enough money to put Mom in a good nursing home for a year or two. But if she needs care for five or six years I cannot afford it. I have heard there are wonderful and affordable facilities in other countries but have no idea how to find them. Does anyone know how you can find quality dementia care in Costa Rica and or Mexico?
Not looking for a Medicaid answer. Thank you for your help.
From what I have seen many of the nursing homes in the US are not great. After reading about amount of people that died in nursing homes with Covid I reached out looking for information. Not insulting comments and prejudices!
Have a great evening!
IMHO, the care given to patients is not based on their ability to pay top dollar. MANY people wind up needing Medicaid.
If my mom goes into care, she will only have enough to private pay for a year, maybe 2. Then she'd be Medicaid dependent. I wouldn't want her thousands of miles from us...maybe it's cheaper, but the cost of care is NOT the only thing at play here.
We had a poster (Sue) who had her mom in a NH or MC in Mexico.
Here is a link to one of her posts
https://www.agingcare.com/discussions/change-of-plan-447135.htm
Be sure to read her bio as she explains how she went about moving back and forth from California to Mexico.
Her mom died in 2019.
I'm sure you can find seemingly great places that are less expensive in other countries but there will be other factors to consider, like distance, language barrier, concept of care, borders closing due to covid, the value of the US dollar against their currency, political and criminal instability (both Mexico and CR have very active gang activity), unknown legal structures that would allow you to pursue solutions if there were issues with her care or payment, and the possibility that your mom may need care longer than six years. If your mom has dementia, adjusting to change will already be challenging...now think about adjusting to an entirely new culture, food, language...
IMHO you should not be planning to pay for your mom's ongoing care as this is unsustainable and robs from your own future. If your mom entered a good NH on private pay in the US, then Medicaid would cover her care if she qualified. It would be very important to know how and when she would qualify by consulting with a Medicaid Planner for her state or an elder law attorney.
I personally would be very hesitant to send a very vulnerable person thousands of miles away where I would have trouble checking on her in person more than once a year.
People on Medicaid are not treated any differently than self-pay individuals. The staff have no idea who is on Medicaid and who isn't. My Mom paid privately and transitioned into Medicaid.
International care homes search might help.
Maybe contacting the Mexican consulate in your town or the American one where you're interested.
That's where I would start.
Wishing you the best of luck finding the situation you're looking for and the responses that suit you best.
As for covid - I can't imagine nursing homes are any safer in either county you've mentioned (although some states do seem to be much more cautious than others).
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