By Christina Hawes
Life expectancy has doubled in the past 150 years. According to a demographic life expectancy chart from Berkley’s web page, On average in the 1900’s Americans both male and female lived between the ages of 46-48 years of age ( www.demog.berkley.edu ).
Now that age has doubled to 78- 80 years of age. With this steady rise in age also increases the need for care.
Families taking care of their aging relatives either take care of them within the family or seek an alternative; nursing homes.
“My grandmother is disabled and my family has to help her a lot and its very stressful on us at times,” says Tenia Waddell a junior majoring in biology at William Peace University.
With the cost to live in American society steadily rising and being that health care is not as attainable to the population as a whole, families have to pay for things out of pocket, which is a financial stressor.
Some families, who prefer nursing homes as an alternative, also have stressor on making sure their relatives are being cared for. Denise Hawkins, who works with Comfort Care, aids these relatives inside nursing homes.
“Some care provided is paid out of families own pockets, if coverage was available, the insurance company would pay for this but with mental health cut backs, the patients themselves and families are solely responsible for expenses occurred,” says Hawkins.
With the population and age rising why is the cost for care so costly?