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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

VA Aid and Attendance Benefits

VA aid and attendance benefits - St Petersbug

Florida VA aid and attendance benefits

Are You a Veteran or the Surviving Spouse of a Veteran?

The Department of Veterans Affairs (“VA”) provides long-term care benefits called improved pension, which is more commonly known as VA Aid and Attendance to certain eligible people. These benefits are available to many wartime veterans and their surviving spouses who need help paying the costs related to home care or assisted living care.

Unfortunately, many people give up on pursuing Aid and Attendance benefits. This is largely due to people thinking they do not qualify after they take a look at the VA income and asset requirements. Don’t make this mistake! In addition, the qualification rules for the Aid and Attendance program changed as of October 18, 2018, so if you didn’t qualify before October 18, 2018, there is a chance that you will now qualify under the new qualification rules.

People who incorrectly assume that they won’t qualify often don’t realize that the income restrictions are not based upon gross income but are, instead, based on a type of net income calculated after unreimbursed medical expenses are subtracted.

They don’t realize that, similar to Medicaid planning, not everything they own is counted as an asset. Some assets are exempt from being counted. When you come to us for help, we can show you that these benefits may actually be available to you.

Choose to Work with Our VA-accredited Elder Law Attorney to Learn About Qualifying for VA Aid and Attendance Benefits

When you choose to work with our VA-accredited attorney, we will take all the time necessary to get to know you and your situation. We will answer any questions you have regarding your eligibility to obtain long-term care benefits from the VA, such as assessing your qualifying service, income limits and asset limits.

We will also educate you on why it is important to look at the VA Aid and Attendance program and the Florida Medicaid program together. Many times, an applicant for VA Aid and Attendance benefits may also need Medicaid benefits in the future should he or she move into a nursing home. The qualification rules and exemptions for the two programs are not the same and it takes careful coordination in order to make the two programs work together. For example, if you choose an asset qualification strategy that works for the VA Aid and Attendance program without checking to see if it will also work for the Florida Medicaid program, you could accidentally make yourself ineligible for future Medicaid benefits.

Our attorney is well-versed in both the VA Aid and Attendance rules and the Florida Medicaid rules, and can help you look at how both programs can work together.

At Edwards Elder Law, P.A., we are proud to serve our nation’s veterans and their family members in obtaining benefits that can help pay for long-term care. Our elder law attorneys are dedicated to ensuring that each individual who comes to us for assistance receives personalized guidance and the security of peace of mind; we keep our client base small for these specific reasons.

If you are a wartime veteran, the surviving spouse of a wartime veteran, or a veteran’s family member, we encourage you to contact Edwards Elder Law as soon as possible to discuss whether the Aid and Attendance program may benefit your family.

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  • Wills and Trusts
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  • 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 20, 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.

    Additional UI, design, and readability adjustments

    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