Choosing a long-term care living arrangement is one of the most difficult challenges faced by aging adults and their loved ones. Most families try to avoid the nursing home option to the very end, believing that assisted living or small residential care homes provide a better quality of life. But this may not necessarily be the case.
New research suggests that the type of living situation itself makes little difference in a resident’s emotional well-being. Instead, the happiness and contentment of the resident depends more on the characteristics of the specific environment they’re in, and of course in no small part on their own personal characteristics — how healthy they feel they are, their age, and even their marital status.
Logically enough, a resident of a long-term care facility of any kind is more likely to report satisfaction and comfort if they had a hand in choosing their living situation, if they were part of the decision making process. In fact, studies show that the process of finding and choosing a living situation—researching options, visiting facilities, considering current and future social and physical needs and how they will be met—plays a very important role in the beginning of acclimatization.
Whatever your choice, you’ll need to talk to your family and plan how to finance whichever choice is made for long-term care living. Medicare.gov has published a helpful chart summarizing and comparing the various options for long-term care financing. Remember: There may be ways that you can conserve savings and the home while still qualifying for government benefits. Many families are actually surprised to learn this. If nursing home care may be in the future, the best option is to plan now. See our “Consumer’s Guide to Medi-Cal Planning” available as a free download.