If you’re selling to consumers in Florida, Nevada or New York, they might need private long-term care insurance (LTCI) more than prospects living in Hawaii, Kansas or Connecticut.
Researchers at the AARP Public Policy Institute, Washington, tell the tale in a “long-term services and supports” state scorecard they created together with the SCAN Foundation, Long Beach, Calif., and the Commonwealth Fund, New York.
Dr. Bruce Chernoff, the president of the SCAN Foundation, presented a talk on the study recently at the Intercompany Long Term Care Insurance Conference in Las Vegas.
The researchers who created the scorecard spent two years designing the study and gathering the data. They looked for performance indicators in areas such as affordability and access, choice of setting and provider, quality of life and quality of care, support for family caregivers, and organization of care and transitions from one level of care to another.
In some cases, the researchers came up with the results that health policy researchers usually come up with: Performance is terrible in the Southeast and Appalachia, and better in the Plains states.
But the researchers also came up with some surprises as they gathered the information they used to produce their Long-Term Services and Supports map.
New York ranks 41st in terms of performance, and just above Louisiana.
Florida, a state that often outshines other Southeastern states on acute-care measures, ranks 43rd. Just below Louisiana.
Nevada is ranked 40th, and Indiana, a state known for being a pioneer in the Long Term Care Partnership program, ranks 47th.
The top 5 states are Wisconsin, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington state and, in first place, Minnesota.