HCG Secure and Arctos Foundation Study Finds Adult Children Often Shoulder Care Navigation for Parents Who Need Long-Term Care and are Unprepared for the Cost

-  75% of adult children navigated long-term care options for their parents
-  77% of parents received long-term care in their own home or at the home of a family member
-  28% of adult children felt their parents were very prepared to cover the costs of long-term care
-  50% of adult children felt their parents' actual care costs were in line with what they expected

NEW YORK, Nov. 10, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- On a mission to improve the aging-at-home experience, insurance product and solution innovator, HCG Secure, today released a unique study and interview series in light of November's National Family Caregivers Month. The study provides quantitative insight while the interviews provide a window into the real-world experiences of the 65 million family caregivers in the US, comprising 90% of all caregivers in America.

The study showed parents with long-term care needs in the United States predominantly relied on their adult children and spouses to guide them through long-term care needs. Even those with a basic level of caregiving preparedness experienced financial, emotional, and physical stresses. This starts early in the process of caregiving, as many participants described their lack of knowledge of what care is needed and what is covered by insurance, making their experiences difficult to navigate. Once care was established, the participants acknowledged the financial cost of caregiving was higher than anticipated and was not something they foresaw being sustainable for the long term, in their current circumstances.

"Each of these stories feels familiar and somewhat universal, despite differences in respondents' incomes, ages, and circumstances," said Tom Beauregard, CEO and Founder of HCG Secure. "So many middle-income American families are having challenging experiences as unpaid caregivers, and too often, these individuals are overlooked or the challenges they face are misunderstood and minimized. As a nation, we need to generate public- and private-sector solutions supporting all families with a reasonable level of financial and non-financial support as they face the inevitable challenges of aging and long-term care support needs."

Interview participants echoed a broader need for guidance as family caregivers navigate the complexities of the healthcare system and work to understand long-term care options, particularly those options which allow aging adults to stay in the home (or, the place they call home) for as long as possible. A lack of preparation further complicates the process for adult children who are not geographically located near their parents, which is increasingly common.

"It took my sister and I nearly 300 hours together to create a care plan for our father, and most of that was going to find and organize his financial and health records. Without preparation, we had to make a lot of important decisions in a vulnerable state of mind," said one participant, Stan Horwitz, in the study. "It was complicated to figure out what care was needed, what was covered and what was not, how much everything would cost, and more importantly what resources we could hire to give our father the quality care he needed."

An unforeseen consequence of a lack of planning, aside from the financial burden, is the difficulty of acquiring quality care. Family members are more often untrained and cannot administer the same quality of care as trained individuals. The financial effects on the unpaid family caregiver can cost them up to $300,000 in lost earnings.

HCG Secure's study and interviews differ from past research in the long-term care and caregiving spaces as this research centers in the financial burden of caregiving and how the financial responsibility adult children often assume for aging parents can catalyze or exacerbate the much-studied emotional burden faced by family caregivers. The study was conducted on the long-term care and caregiver challenges of 401 individuals; 109 individuals, those who had a parent or a parent-in-law who needed long-term care, were recontacted and invited to participate in a series of one-on-one interviews. During these sessions, participants were asked to tell their stories more fully and reflect on how these experiences impacted them - both at the time and as they plan for their own future long-term care needs. Ten respondents who had indicated experience caring for an aging loved one were selected for individual discussions.

To access the study results and qualitative interviews, please visit https://hcgsecure.com/independent-research/ 

HCG Secure was founded by healthcare and insurance veterans who all individually have experienced the challenges of supporting loved ones through their aging process. Collectively, they wanted to bring their decades of experience and build solutions directly serving the consumer and minimizing the hardships that come with having an aging loved one. HCG Secure innovates with the end customer in mind – providing individuals and families with the resources, support, and navigation to age confidently. The current offerings include indemnity insurance coverage for short-term home health care, as well as life insurance with accelerated benefits, tools, and assistance at your time of need - now, or in the future. For more information, visit www.hcgsecure.com.

HCG Secure operates as Home Care Genie™.

Contact: Liang Zhao, [email protected]

SOURCE HCG Secure