Elder Law Commons^™

One Fund Solution And The Pension Crisis, Gordon Butler

Cleveland State Law Review

The next forty years of economic life will be dominated by one underlying theme: dealing with the retirement income security of a growing, aging and longer-lived global population. This is a "can’t run, can’t hide" problem that will affect the lives of almost every human being on the planet . . . Whether you are light in your pension account, whether you have more money than Croesus, whether you live in the well-funded Netherlands, or whether you are a put-upon unambitious young male in Japan who sees no future for himself, you cannot escape this problem.

Before you read very …

Legal Considerations For Assisted Living Facilities, Y. Tony Yang

Journal of Law and Health

The elderly population in the United States will expand drastically over the next few decades; indeed, the number of persons aged 65 or older is expected to swell to approximately 19 percent of the nation’s population by 2030--a staggering statistic in light of the fact that the present population of elderly people constitutes fewer than 13 percent. Largely because of this fact, long-term care for this population is becoming increasingly important. Traditionally, elderly persons who lost the ability to fully care for themselves would enter a healthcare facility known as a nursing home. However, a relatively new alternative exists in …

Elder Self-Neglect And Adult Protective Services: Ohio Needs To Do More, William White

Journal of Law and Health

Ohio APS statutes are antiquated, do not reflect the increasingly complex needs of self-neglecting elderly, and need to be changed to decrease the likelihood of significant self-harm or even death, as represented in the story of Carlene. Section II of this paper provides background information on elder self-neglect and APS. Section III discusses why Ohio needs to mandate that APS jurisdiction includes nursing facilities and how the law could be effectively changed. Section IV discusses how APS interventions need to evolve to meet the diverse needs of the growing elderly population; a singular investigative response no longer fits for every …

To Pay Or Not To Pay: Medicare And The Preventable Adverse Event: A Rational Decision Of Dangerous Philosophical Change, Amy J. Chaho M.D.

Journal of Law and Health

The proposed Medicare reimbursement schedule intended to become effective in October 2008 represents a drastic change to the traditional policy of payment for needed services. The proposal mandates that certain preventable adverse events should not be reimbursed. This spending scheme is intended to improve quality while decreasing cost to the Medicare system. The goals of the spending scheme are laudable. Quality improvement, when used to improve the health, safety and general welfare of the intended patient beneficiary of the Medicare program, is a rational and compelling government interest that warrants coercive use of authorized spending power. This beneficial interest may …

Discretion To Follow The Law: The Collision Of Ohio's Nursing Home Bill Of Rights With Ohio's Political Subdivision Tort Liability Act, Peter Traska Elk & Elk Co., Ltd., Katherine Knouff

Journal of Law and Health

The Ohio Political Subdivision Tort Liability Act confers general immunity on political subdivisions. Therefore, government owned homes seek to avoid liability by raising the defenses provided by the Ohio Political Subdivision Tort Liability Act, despite the resident's rights under the Nursing Home Bill of Rights. The result is that residents of government owned nursing homes have inferior remedies for the tortious acts of a county home's employees. The disparate treatment meted out to residents of county owned homes opens the Political Subdivision Act to another challenge: equal protection. The law formerly recognized that government actors taking part in the marketplace …

A Philosophy Of Privatization: Rationing Health Care Through The Medicare Modernization Act Of 2003, Eleanor Bhat Sorresso

Journal of Law and Health

The trend in coping with these rising Medicare costs has been to increase the role that private insurance plays in providing coverage for Medicare recipients. Much of this movement towards an increased "privatization" of Medicare has been born of the belief that the private sector of health care insurance coverage has been made more efficient by existing market forces and will provide a way to both continue providing health care to elderly Americans while containing Medicare costs through these increased efficiencies as exemplified through the managed care model. This premise will be further explored in this article. First, this article …

In Search Of The Golden Years: How Compulsory Licensing Can Lower The Price Of Prescription Drugs For Millions Of Senior Citizens In The United States, Debjani Roy

Cleveland State Law Review

This article will show that compulsory licensing is the best remedy for the escalating cost of prescription drugs in the United States. Section II will provide a historical overview of American pharmaceutical patent law and will introduce the concept of compulsory licensing as a method to decrease the high cost of prescription drugs for senior citizens in the United States. Section III will look at the newly enacted Medicare Prescription Drug and Modernization Act, and state and local government plans to import cheaper brand-name prescription drugs from Canada. Section IV will look at the United States' international support for compulsory …

Book Review, Kenneth J. Kowalski

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Reviewing L. S. Platt & C. Ventrell-Monsees, Age Discrimination Litigation, James Publishing (2000)

The Challenge Of Providing Adequate Housing For The Elderly . . . Along With Everyone, Alan C. Weinstein

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Our patterns of land use and development have failed to accommodate the changed housing needs of an aging population. Primary among these needs is the desire of the elderly to be able to "age in place." To meet this need, America's suburban communities in particular will need to re-think their reliance on exclusive single-family zoning and begin planning and zoning for an increasingly large number of the elderly. Despite understandable concerns about maintaining housing values, this may well prove to be politically achievable simply because the very demographic changes that create the need will create a growing constituency in favor …

Essay: The Challenge Of Providing Adequate Housing For The Elderly...Along With Everyone Else, Alan C. Weinstein

Journal of Law and Health

Finally, it seems fittingly ironic that a culture as youth-obsessed as ours faces a demographic future in which those over sixty-five will outnumber those under fourteen for the first time in our history. Irony aside, we are ill-prepared to deal with this new reality on several counts, not the least of which is the failure of our patterns of land use and development to accommodate the changed housing needs of an aging population. Primary among these needs is the stated desire of the elderly to be able to "age in place." To meet this need, America's suburban communities in particular …