Texas Care Association Wants Focus On Eldercare For Primary

The Texas Health Care Association (THCA) urges the major presidential candidates of both parties to go beyond the discussion of increasing Americans' health insurance access, and to also include a needed discussion on how to strengthen long term care programs for the benefit of Texas' seniors and disabled citizens. "As more Boomers enter our retirement system, our residents and the caregivers who serve them want to know specifically what each candidate will do to bolster Medicare and Medicaid financing in a way that ensures we have the ongoing capacity to provide quality care today as well as tomorrow," Graves says.Graves says proposed federal cuts to Medicare and Medicaid contained in the Bush administration's fiscal year 2009 federa budget -- on top of Texas' already over-burdened state Medicaid program -- will create an even more problematic scenario for the state's most vulnerable elderly and disabled residents. "With upwards of 60 percent of nursing home operating expenses driven by labor costs, additional financial pressures placed on facilitiescaused by federal funding cuts will undermine patients, and further destabilize our direct care workforce," Graves says.In the wake of federal efforts to reduce Medicare and Medicaid funding, THCA is encouraging a broader public debate surrounding long term care financing issues, and why Texas' daily Medicaid reimbursement rate has slipped to 49th in the nation, which, Graves observed, does not have the capacity to meet the growing complex care needs of Texas' rapidly agingpopulation.

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