Elder Law

Health Bill Focuses on Elder Abuse

By Levin & Perconti

The new health care law has many benefits for the American people. One important group of individuals that are set to gain from the law is the elderly. The health care law contains a provision for $777 million that will be spread over the next four years. This money will be allocated for programs to prevent and prosecute elder abuse. The provisions mirror those that were contained in the Elder Justice Act, legislation that was backed by the National Center of Elder Abuse.

The New York Times is reporting that the nursing home legislation will give state and local adult protective service programs financing from the federal government. These agencies will then be better able to investigate reports of elder abuse and neglect. It will also tackle the ever pressing need to attack financial exploitation of elderly and disabled adults. This will happen because the nursing home legislation will finance 1,700 new investigators of elder abuse around the country. States will be given demonstration grants so they themselves may test various approaches of adult protective services. Also, the funding will allow for new state ombudsmen to be trained to investigate complaints related to these long-term care facilities.

Finally the nursing home legislation will create a new council through the federal secretary of Health and Human Services that will make recommendations on ways of preventing elder abuse. The Chicago nursing home lawyers of Levin & Perconti applaud this new legislation and the stance it takes on elder abuse. To read more about the nursing home legislation, please click the link.

Full post as published by Illinois Nursing Home Abuse Blog on April 27, 2010 (boomark / email).