Editorial guides
Practical articles, checklists and explanations built around Italian nursing homes, urgent placement, waiting lists and home-care decisions.
Featured guide
In most cases it is not a stranger on the phone — it is someone close. The signs, the mistake to avoid when you raise it, and the steps that actually stop the money leaving.
Healthy Connections (South Carolina Medicaid) is how most South Carolina families pay for a long nursing-home stay — but it is means-tested. The asset and income limits, the five-year look-back, spousal protections, estate recovery and home-care waivers, explained plainly.
Health First Colorado is how most Colorado families pay for a long nursing-home stay — but it is means-tested. The asset and income limits, the five-year look-back, spousal protections, estate recovery and home-care waivers, explained plainly.
Medical Assistance (Minnesota Medicaid) is how most Minnesota families pay for a long nursing-home stay — but it is means-tested. The asset and income limits, the five-year look-back, spousal protections, estate recovery and home-care waivers, explained plainly.
Alabama Medicaid is how most Alabama families pay for a long nursing-home stay — but it is means-tested. The asset and income limits, the five-year look-back, spousal protections, estate recovery and home-care waivers, explained plainly.
Indiana Medicaid is how most Indiana families pay for a long nursing-home stay — but it is means-tested. The asset and income limits, the five-year look-back, spousal protections, estate recovery and home-care waivers, explained plainly.
MO HealthNet (Missouri Medicaid) is how most Missouri families pay for a long nursing-home stay — but it is means-tested. The asset and income limits, the five-year look-back, spousal protections, estate recovery and home-care waivers, explained plainly.
Maryland Medicaid is how most Maryland families pay for a long nursing-home stay — but it is means-tested. The asset and income limits, the five-year look-back, spousal protections, estate recovery and home-care waivers, explained plainly.
Wisconsin Medicaid is how most Wisconsin families pay for a long nursing-home stay — but it is means-tested. The asset and income limits, the five-year look-back, spousal protections, estate recovery and home-care waivers, explained plainly.
MassHealth has no hard income cap: a pension that disqualifies someone in Texas or Arizona does not disqualify them in Massachusetts. It is a spend-down state with the country's highest medically needy limit at $522 a month. The 2026 figures and the spousal protections.
Most read
In most cases it is not a stranger on the phone — it is someone close. The signs, the mistake to avoid when you raise it, and the steps that actually stop the money leaving.
From two time zones away you cannot tour ten facilities or drop in daily. The local network to build before the crisis, the documents to hold, and how to use the visits you do make.
Almost nobody moves into a nursing home by decision — they move after a fall. The changes in order of effect, what Medicare and Medicaid actually pay for, and the signs home is no longer enough.
Clothes that survive an industrial laundry, the paperwork that actually matters, and the one page about her life that is worth more than everything else. Plus the classic first-day mistakes.
