My mother has both Alzheimer’s Disease and an ileostomy. Due to her AD she uses quite a lot more ostomy supplies than her insurance (which follows Medicare/Medicaid guidelines) will cover. I purchase all her additional supplies, averaging $300.00 to $600.00/month. My parents are currently in the Personal Care (aka assisted living) section of a graduated care facility. Within the next year or so their savings will run out. From time to time they write me a check for for $500.00, writing, “for all you do for us” on the memo line. Will these checks result in a Medicaid denial?
So for example, if I transfer $500 to my daughter in exchange for her helping me out, that is a gift of the full $500 unless she has given me an itemized list of what she did for me before or contemporaneous with the transfer of $500 to her, and the value of her work equals or exceeds $500. In other words, if she helped me out last year, but did not bill me at that time, I cannot now give her money for that service; it's too late.
You will find these rules in the Medicaid regulations of the state in which you reside. The federal rules simply mention "uncompensated transfers," i.e., gifts.
For a complete discussion of the rules of gifting for Medicaid purposes, see the chapter in my book "How to Protect Your Family's Assets from Devastating Nursing Home Costs: Medicaid Secrets" (MedicaidSecrets.com) or the less-expensive eBook "Gifts: Avoiding the Penalties," available here: medicaidsecrets.com/eBooks.html
You may also want to refresh yourselves on what assets are "countable Medicaid assets."
Grace + Peace,
Bob
Ideally, stop doing that. Order your mother's supplies online and pay for them with your parents' money, not your own. Or keep any checks they give you in a separate, dedicated account and keep good records of what you are spending it on.
For now, you'd better add up and gather together any receipts, invoices and bank statements that will prove the pattern of spending. As long as you can show that you were in fact spending the money on your parents' needs it shouldn't matter too much what a frail elderly gentleman noted on the check stub.
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