Medicaid costs for disabled Ohioans expected to skyrocket

According to two Miami University researchers, the state needs to brace for both an increase in the number of elderly Ohioans with serious disabilities and an increase in the cost to care for them. (Source: “Long-Term Care Report Shows Cost Growing by Billions in Coming Decade, Beyond,” The Hannah Report, June 11, 2008).

Shahla Mehdizadeh and Bob Applebaum, who work at Miami’s Scripps Gerontology Center, presented the findings Wednesday to the Joint Committee on Medicaid Technology and Reform. The data is part of a study forecasting demand and cost for long-term care through 2020.

About 308,000 Ohioans, roughly 3 percent of the state population, were seriously disabled in 2007, Mehdizadeh said. That number is expected to grow by about 1 percent a year to 348,000 by 2020. In 2007, $4.7 billion in Medicaid was spent on long-term care, and Mehdizadeh and Applebaum predict that by 2020 that number could grow to between $7.8 billion and $14.4 billion. And, they warned, the most dramatic increase in cost will likely occur a few years after 2020 when the first Baby Boomers reach their upper 70s.

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