Healthy Aging Month: Aging With Dignity Takes a Village

This Healthy Aging Month, we at Medicare Rights are highlighting the importance of comprehensive medical and community care to healthy and happy aging for older adults.

Preventive Care

Keeping up with regular preventive care appointments is one of the most important aspects of maintaining health and minimizing the risk of more dangerous illnesses down the line. For those regularly taking medication or living with a chronic condition, consistent preventive care is especially important to manage and maintain their health.

As with all stages of life, older adulthood can bring its own challenges, commonly prompted by physical, environmental, and behavioral changes. As a result, doctors often focus on particular areas in preventive care for older adults, including bone and dental health, memory and brain health, eye health, and hearing loss. Mental health care is also essential to combat the toll of loneliness and bereavement; nearly 15% of adults aged 50 and older have a mental health disorder, and this number is expected to increase.

Older adulthood can bring its own challenges, commonly prompted by physical, environmental, and behavioral changes.

Medicare covers a wide range of physical and mental health preventive services, many without cost sharing for the patient if the provider is a participating provider (for Original Medicare) or an in-network provider (for Medicare Advantage). Preventive care recommended by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force is free at the point of service for beneficiaries if they meet the relevant eligibility requirements and guidelines. Services from providers who are out of network or do not participate in Medicare may not be completely covered, so it is important to check what your options are if you have recently changed providers or plans.

In some cases, a preventive care visit may lead to additional diagnostic care if a provider discovers something that needs further investigation. Costs and coverage for diagnostic care are determined by different rules, and Medicare may bill beneficiaries for separate diagnostic services that arise from a preventive care visit.

Aging on Your Own Terms

When surveyed, older adults consistently respond that they would prefer to live independently in their communities as they age, as opposed to living in institutions. Older adults enrich their communities and are supported by them in turn; they are valued friends and mentors whose age only strengthens their ties to the community. Robust community living services are therefore essential to helping people age on their own terms and to sustaining a society that embraces its older adults.

Robust community living services are essential to helping people age on their own terms and to sustaining a society that embraces its older adults.

Community living as a standard for healthy aging provides a less expensive option than institutional care for most older adults, and it makes culturally competent care more accessible by keeping the beneficiary integrated within their community. And it is also the law; the landmark Olmstead case established the rights of those with disabilities to receive care in community-integrated settings.

States across the country have created “livable communities” that meet the needs of older adults and make spaces safe and more accessible for the whole community. The AARP initiative to create exercise facilities for older adults to promote brain health provides a successful example of providing concrete physical and mental health care while keeping older adults in their communities.

Supporting Caregivers

Older adults in the United States are both caregivers and care recipients in the growing care industry, with many of them in caregiving relationships with direct family members. The role of a caregiver comes with an amount of responsibility and stress that is comparable to a full-time job, but without the same protections and benefits. This is further complicated when family members shift into caregiver roles, changing existing emotional bonds and introducing difficult questions around boundaries, independence, and intimacy.

Ensuring that caregivers are adequately supported and protected for their work protects both caregivers and care recipients, and it promotes the building of stronger and more sustainable communities around older adults and care professionals.

Cost Saving Programs in New York and Nationwide

The cost of health care is too often prohibitively high for older adults in the U.S., even with Medicare coverage. Medicare households spend more of their budget on health care costs than their non-Medicare counterparts, and costs add up due to gaps and other limitations to Medicare coverage. Policy initiatives that impact Medicare and Medicaid funding can worsen or alleviate these problems, and in the face of sweeping federal cuts to health care spending, some states are proactively working to expand cost-saving programs for their residents.

The cost of health care is too often prohibitively high for older adults in the U.S.

Medicare Savings Programs (MSPs) are administered by state Medicaid offices to help income-qualified individuals lower their Medicare costs. Each state sets its own income and asset limits within a federal limit, meaning that some states offer much more expansive assistance than others. In New York, for instance, a 2023 expansion led to over 300,000 more people becoming eligible for MSPs, and enrollment changes starting this fall are set to streamline and personalize MSP enrollment for New Yorkers so that eligible beneficiaries do not miss cost-saving opportunities.