Elder Law

Elder Law: Cases and Materials, Sixth Edition, is thoroughly updated for use by veteran professors and newcomers in the field. It covers the government programs Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, employer pensions, age discrimination, health and long term care quality, housing options, guardianship and alternatives, elder abuse and financial exploitation, and health care decision making. As in past editions, ethical issues relating to mental capacity and family representation are introduced, then explored in subsequent chapters.

Through expanded explanations, students are encouraged to grasp the frameworks of such complex programs as Medicare and Medicaid. Questions and hypothetical problems, with answers provided to the teacher, will stimulate student discussion of underlying elder law policies and strategies of practice. These provide regular opportunities to assess student comprehension.

New material beginning in the first chapter recognizes the implications of greater longevity among those who are approaching old age, and how their lifestyles differ from 20th century expectations. Always of note, the chapter "Paying for Long Term Care", presents the federal rules governing eligibility and limitations of Medicaid coverage for the cost of nursing home care, the heart of Medicaid planning. The chapter also describes desirable alternatives to Medicaid long term care, based on making an elder's assets last a lifetime. The chapter "Health Care Decision making" describes evolving attitudes and law on physician assisted dying, given the growing number of states providing this option to citizens.

This book also is available in a three-hole punched, alternative loose-leaf version printed on 8.5 x 11 inch paper with wider margins and with the same pagination as the hardbound book.