Reports

This summary of demographic and economic statistics from 2007 on the non-institutionalized population with disabilities is meant for policy makers, advocates, reporters, and the public. Data include information on the population size and disability prevalence for various demographic subpopulations, as well as statistics related to employment, earnings, and household income. Comparisons are made to people without disabilities and across disability types.

This report analyzes Alaska’s LTC system and makes recommendations for reform. The report provides a discussion of the opportunities and challenges of the various Medicaid authorities for funding LTC, including new DRA options. Recommendations include establishing mechanisms for controlling costs; streamlining access and coordinating assessment processes; developing a quality management strategy that complies with CMS requirements; and increasing consumer direction.

This resource provides tools, contact information, and lessons learned from eight research projects that focused on providing a more stable and qualified workforce. These projects, including state demonstrations and applied research and evaluation programs, are part of the four-year, $15.5 million Better Jobs Better Care initiative. The report compiles the major findings, and the resource catalog provides surveys, policy analyses, training and assessment materials, and many more practical tools.

Visitability is a movement that seeks to eliminate certain barriers to aging independently by promoting accessible home design. The authors examine different types of visitability initiatives, challenges to implementation, and opportunities for further acceptance. The design parameters needed for visitability include a zero-step entrance, wide doorways, and at least one half bathroom on the main floor.

Since 2002, MetLife Mature Market Institute has gathered data on the costs of long-term care in institutional and community-based settings. This 2008 report looks at home care and adult day services. Costs are broken down by state, metropolitan statistical area (MSA), and “rest of state,” or areas not in a MSA. Home care costs are measured in hourly private pay rates, and adult day costs are measured in daily private pay rates.

This document describes new processes developed at an Area Agency on Aging (AAA) in Florida to ensure that clients are receiving quality case management services. The report contains flow diagrams depicting evaluation process for monthly home visits, provider review during annual monitoring, and complaint tracking as well as the new client satisfaction process which is to implemented annually.

Is your area a livable community? You can use this survey and accompanying reports as a model for finding out. AARP defines a livable community as one that allows people to maintain their independence and quality of life as they age and retire. Aspects that make a community livable include mobility, community supports, and affordable housing. Residents age 45 years and older in two OH counties were surveyed to measure whether these things are truly available in their communities.

In the U.S., workers that experience disability onset are unlikely to receive return-to-work supports unless their disability is work-related or they have private disability coverage. The Pathways to Work program in the UK offers a range of supports that focus on preventing loss of work. After 18 months of evaluation, the data shows that it substantially improves outcomes. This brief offers lessons for U.S. policymakers that may pursue this strategy in the future.

This report provides a summary of how long-term services and supports (LTSS) are financed and describes factors that contribute to uncertainty of the future costs for LTSS, including changes in how LTSS will be delivered. Three projections of future LTSS spending for senior populations under different scenarios are offered. These scenarios differ based on projecting the number of people with varying functional limitations and the resulting need for varying degrees of LTSS.

This brief, the eighth in a series on working with disability, looks at the employment outcomes of participants in CommonHealth Working (CHW), Massachusetts’s Medicaid Buy-In program. Differences in post-enrollment employment rates, monthly hours worked and earnings, and private health insurance coverage are compared between new CHW enrollees previously covered by MassHealth, Massachusetts’s Medicaid program, and those without prior MassHealth coverage.