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  • Home
  • About
    • What is Elder Law?
    • Our Philosophy
    • Our Team
  • Practice Areas
    • Estate Planning
    • Wills and Trusts
    • Probate and Trust Administration
    • Incapacity Planning
    • Medicaid Long-Term Care Benefits
    • VA Aid and Attendance Benefits
  • Giving Back
  • Latest News
  • Contact
    • Location, Directions & Parking
    • Complimentary Consultation

Medicaid Long-Term Care Benefits

Medicaid long-term care benefits - St Petersburg

Florida Medicaid long-term care benefits

Determining eligibility for Medicaid long-term care benefits can be confusing and, without the assistance of an experienced Medicaid planning attorney, you could feel bewildered and frustrated about what your future may hold. At Edwards Elder Law, P.A., we are proud to provide trusted guidance and peace of mind to clients throughout the St. Petersburg, Florida, area. We also work with adult children who may live elsewhere but who are seeking knowledge of Florida Medicaid long-term care laws on behalf of their parents who are Pinellas County, Florida, residents.

Edwards Elder Law focuses exclusively on handling elder law concerns, so you can be confident that you will be provided the information you require throughout the course of creating an appropriate plan for you or your family member’s current and future care. We offer compassionate counsel throughout the process of assessing your options, making preparations, and taking the mystery out of how to plan for long-term care.

We Can Help You Ask the Right Questions

Medicaid long-term care planning is different in every state. What is appropriate in one state may or may not be appropriate in another state. Because of this, seeking knowledgeable guidance as soon as possible is crucial to avoid penalties and delays in your efforts to obtain Florida Medicaid long-term care assistance.

Medicaid planning can help you identify your long-term care needs. Our Florida Medicaid planning attorney can assess your Florida Medicaid long-term care benefit program options and determine if those benefit programs will cover your needs.

Determining the Type of Care You or Your Loved One Needs

Every decision about whether Medicaid long-term care benefits are available to someone starts with determining the level of care that he or she needs. You will need to ask whether the appropriate level of care is one of the following:

  • Care at home
  • Care in an assisted living community
  • Care in a nursing home

Many people have unfortunate misperceptions regarding assisted living communities. These misperceptions can keep people from seeking help and cause them to remain in their homes even when the home is no longer the safest place for them to live. Assisted living communities are different than nursing homes, which cater to more pronounced physical needs.

Assisted Living Communities

Assisted living communities can offer some of the privacy of living at home because residents can have their own rooms or apartments, as well as built-in assistance that can make living there safer than living at home. Assisted living communities offer meals, laundry service, transportation, and organized activities, which can feel like concierge living. They also provide an environment where someone will notice if a resident falls and where a care professional is on hand to assist with dressing, bathing, or moving safely about the community.

Nursing Homes

Nursing homes are more similar to hospitals in that they are for residents who need the highest level of care, plus the rooms typically look more like hospital rooms.

People tend to not want to think about being in a nursing home. However, talking about it, especially if you or a family member is in immediate need of nursing home care, can make it easier to get there and plan how to pay for it.

Medicaid and Other Options for Long-Term Care Payment

Coming to see our Medicaid long-term care benefits attorney for the education, planning assistance, and support you need allows you to learn about attractive and safe living options you may not have known were available. Once we determine the appropriate level of care, then we turn to the question of how you are going to pay for that care, which is a major stumbling block for many people. Many individuals and families don’t have enough private funds or long-term care insurance to cover these costs.

Applying for Medicaid Long-Term Care Benefits in Florida

Medicaid laws in the state of Florida are strict, and determining eligibility and planning for your future can be confusing. When you work with us, we can thoroughly review your situation to help you understand what is the best course of action to take for your unique circumstances.

If we determine that you or your family member needs care in a nursing home, we can usually apply for Medicaid financial assistance fairly quickly. However, if care is needed at home or in an assisted living community, there is a waiting list in Florida to apply for Medicaid financial assistance in these situations. The wait time if you are on this list can be up to one year or more, so meeting with our elder law attorney for Florida Medicaid long-term care benefits planning is essential.

Once we determine when you can apply for Medicaid, we then have to look at how the Florida Medicaid long-term care income and asset qualification rules work. Do not be deterred by the common misconception that a Florida Medicaid applicant has to get rid of all money and assets, and become destitute before he or she can qualify for Medicaid benefits; this is not true.

Medicaid allows applicants to keep certain exempt assets that don’t count toward the asset limit, but the rules for keeping these assets are specific and strictly enforced. You may be subject to penalties and delays in obtaining Florida Medicaid long-term care benefits if you do not follow all of the rules correctly, so call us for help.

We Can Help Guide You Through the Medicaid Long-Term Care Benefit Process

Planning for your future is important. If critical documents and steps are not completed correctly, you and your family may be facing complicated financial issues down the line. At our office, our elder law attorney can educate and assist you so that your documents are complete and accurate, and so that you can have peace of mind.

We keep our client base small and we offer personalized resolutions to each individual who comes to us for our assistance.

We want to make sure that you are able to receive the best possible resolution to your Florida Medicaid long-term care concerns in a timely and professional manner. For more information about how Edwards Elder Law can benefit you, contact our office today and schedule a complimentary consultation with us.

  • Estate Planning
  • Wills and Trusts
  • Probate and Trust Administration
  • Incapacity Planning
  • Medicaid Long-Term Care Benefits
  • VA Aid and Attendance Benefits
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    Edwards Elder Law - St. Petersburg

    Whether you are looking for guidance regarding an elder law issue for a family member or yourself, you can turn to Edwards Elder Law. We help people who have an immediate need for long-term care assistance, as well as people who want to start talking about their options for paying for long-term care assistance before they have this need.

    Practice Areas
    • Estate Planning
    • Wills and Trusts
    • Probate and Trust Administration
    • Incapacity Planning
    • Medicaid Long-Term Care Benefits
    • VA Aid and Attendance Benefits
    Contact Us

    Edwards Elder Law, P.A.
    St. Petersburg, Florida, Elder Law Attorney
    2510 1st Ave. N.
    St. Petersburg, FL 33713
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    (727) 209-8282

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    The information on this website is for general information purposes only. Nothing on this site should be taken as legal advice for any individual case or situation. This information is not intended to create, and receipt or viewing does not constitute, an attorney-client relationship.

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    Edwards Elder Law Accessibility Statement

    Accessibility Statement

    • edwardselderlaw.com
    • August 18, 2022

    Compliance status

    We firmly believe that the internet should be available and accessible to anyone, and are committed to providing a website that is accessible to the widest possible audience, regardless of circumstance and ability.

    To fulfill this, we aim to adhere as strictly as possible to the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 (WCAG 2.1) at the AA level. These guidelines explain how to make web content accessible to people with a wide array of disabilities. Complying with those guidelines helps us ensure that the website is accessible to all people: blind people, people with motor impairments, visual impairment, cognitive disabilities, and more.

    This website utilizes various technologies that are meant to make it as accessible as possible at all times. We utilize an accessibility interface that allows persons with specific disabilities to adjust the website’s UI (user interface) and design it to their personal needs.

    Additionally, the website utilizes an AI-based application that runs in the background and optimizes its accessibility level constantly. This application remediates the website’s HTML, adapts Its functionality and behavior for screen-readers used by the blind users, and for keyboard functions used by individuals with motor impairments.

    If you’ve found a malfunction or have ideas for improvement, we’ll be happy to hear from you. You can reach out to the website’s operators by using the following email

    Screen-reader and keyboard navigation

    Our website implements the ARIA attributes (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) technique, alongside various different behavioral changes, to ensure blind users visiting with screen-readers are able to read, comprehend, and enjoy the website’s functions. As soon as a user with a screen-reader enters your site, they immediately receive a prompt to enter the Screen-Reader Profile so they can browse and operate your site effectively. Here’s how our website covers some of the most important screen-reader requirements, alongside console screenshots of code examples:

    1. Screen-reader optimization: we run a background process that learns the website’s components from top to bottom, to ensure ongoing compliance even when updating the website. In this process, we provide screen-readers with meaningful data using the ARIA set of attributes. For example, we provide accurate form labels; descriptions for actionable icons (social media icons, search icons, cart icons, etc.); validation guidance for form inputs; element roles such as buttons, menus, modal dialogues (popups), and others. Additionally, the background process scans all of the website’s images and provides an accurate and meaningful image-object-recognition-based description as an ALT (alternate text) tag for images that are not described. It will also extract texts that are embedded within the image, using an OCR (optical character recognition) technology. To turn on screen-reader adjustments at any time, users need only to press the Alt+1 keyboard combination. Screen-reader users also get automatic announcements to turn the Screen-reader mode on as soon as they enter the website.

      These adjustments are compatible with all popular screen readers, including JAWS and NVDA.

    2. Keyboard navigation optimization: The background process also adjusts the website’s HTML, and adds various behaviors using JavaScript code to make the website operable by the keyboard. This includes the ability to navigate the website using the Tab and Shift+Tab keys, operate dropdowns with the arrow keys, close them with Esc, trigger buttons and links using the Enter key, navigate between radio and checkbox elements using the arrow keys, and fill them in with the Spacebar or Enter key.Additionally, keyboard users will find quick-navigation and content-skip menus, available at any time by clicking Alt+1, or as the first elements of the site while navigating with the keyboard. The background process also handles triggered popups by moving the keyboard focus towards them as soon as they appear, and not allow the focus drift outside of it.

      Users can also use shortcuts such as “M” (menus), “H” (headings), “F” (forms), “B” (buttons), and “G” (graphics) to jump to specific elements.

    Disability profiles supported in our website

    • Epilepsy Safe Mode: this profile enables people with epilepsy to use the website safely by eliminating the risk of seizures that result from flashing or blinking animations and risky color combinations.
    • Visually Impaired Mode: this mode adjusts the website for the convenience of users with visual impairments such as Degrading Eyesight, Tunnel Vision, Cataract, Glaucoma, and others.
    • Cognitive Disability Mode: this mode provides different assistive options to help users with cognitive impairments such as Dyslexia, Autism, CVA, and others, to focus on the essential elements of the website more easily.
    • ADHD Friendly Mode: this mode helps users with ADHD and Neurodevelopmental disorders to read, browse, and focus on the main website elements more easily while significantly reducing distractions.
    • Blindness Mode: this mode configures the website to be compatible with screen-readers such as JAWS, NVDA, VoiceOver, and TalkBack. A screen-reader is software for blind users that is installed on a computer and smartphone, and websites must be compatible with it.
    • Keyboard Navigation Profile (Motor-Impaired): this profile enables motor-impaired persons to operate the website using the keyboard Tab, Shift+Tab, and the Enter keys. Users can also use shortcuts such as “M” (menus), “H” (headings), “F” (forms), “B” (buttons), and “G” (graphics) to jump to specific elements.

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    1. Font adjustments – users, can increase and decrease its size, change its family (type), adjust the spacing, alignment, line height, and more.
    2. Color adjustments – users can select various color contrast profiles such as light, dark, inverted, and monochrome. Additionally, users can swap color schemes of titles, texts, and backgrounds, with over 7 different coloring options.
    3. Animations – epileptic users can stop all running animations with the click of a button. Animations controlled by the interface include videos, GIFs, and CSS flashing transitions.
    4. Content highlighting – users can choose to emphasize important elements such as links and titles. They can also choose to highlight focused or hovered elements only.
    5. Audio muting – users with hearing devices may experience headaches or other issues due to automatic audio playing. This option lets users mute the entire website instantly.
    6. Cognitive disorders – we utilize a search engine that is linked to Wikipedia and Wiktionary, allowing people with cognitive disorders to decipher meanings of phrases, initials, slang, and others.
    7. Additional functions – we provide users the option to change cursor color and size, use a printing mode, enable a virtual keyboard, and many other functions.

    Browser and assistive technology compatibility

    We aim to support the widest array of browsers and assistive technologies as possible, so our users can choose the best fitting tools for them, with as few limitations as possible. Therefore, we have worked very hard to be able to support all major systems that comprise over 95% of the user market share including Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Opera and Microsoft Edge, JAWS and NVDA (screen readers), both for Windows and for MAC users.

    Notes, comments, and feedback

    Despite our very best efforts to allow anybody to adjust the website to their needs, there may still be pages or sections that are not fully accessible, are in the process of becoming accessible, or are lacking an adequate technological solution to make them accessible. Still, we are continually improving our accessibility, adding, updating and improving its options and features, and developing and adopting new technologies. All this is meant to reach the optimal level of accessibility, following technological advancements. For any assistance, please reach out to