|
Elder Care Law Today
In the past many elder care attorneys
did not practice in the tax law area, did not use mediation and family facilitation as regular
tools for helping their clients, had not had any litigation experience so as to understand how
to prevent and assess issues in that context. They focused primarily on assessing and planning for government assistance.
Today, an effective elder care attorney often has
many more tools and skills to serve his client. Government assistance resources (Medicare, Medicaid,
Social Security, State Programs) can be very technical and it is important to understand all of the constant changes in the
law in this area and how the law is being applied. However, we believe that it is equally important
and vital to be able to recognize and serve almost all of the needs of the elderly or disabled, and to be able to plan ahead
for all of the issues that arise. At Plowden Hall,
we use our tax resources, as well as our business and dispute resolution resources, to provide a comprehensive resource
for dealing with these issues. We provide:
1. Simple and complex estate planning
and post-mortem planning.
2.
Estate, gift, family business and charitable tax planning.3. Long-term and health-care planning.4. Retirement planning.5. Planning for housing and maintenance issues.6. Planning for incapacity and
chronic disease issues.7.
Planning with trusts, insurance, transfers, business assets, and tax deferrals. 8. Using family mediation
for a family-generated game plan on some of these issues.9. Dealing with special needs and related trusts and other opportunities.10. Maximizing the use of available
government support.11.
Minimizing the assessment of taxes when possible.12. Collaborating with other professionals (CPA’s, CFP’s, Physicians,
etc)13. Preventing
or dealing with elder abuse, coercion, influence and enforcing rights.
So, this means that we believe that an effective elder care attorney
not only knows and understands the laws with respect to government assistance, it means that
he should also have a strong knowledge base of applicable tax law, effective mediation and problem-prevention skills, effective risk-management assessment skills and knowledge of the options to use for such management, a
knowledge of businesses and business law from a practical perspective, and an ability
to make all of these areas of the law and related activities work for you and your family. She
should also understand (and hopefully participated in) some litigation. This is Elder Care law today.
|
