House Calls: The Impact of Home-Based Care for Older Adults With Alzheimer's and Dementia

Older adults with Alzheimer's/dementia have high health care costs; they may benefit from home-based care, but few have home visits. This article describes a home-based care program for frail elders, including those with Alzheimer's/dementia. Descriptive statistics are provided for Medicare-enrolled program participants and matched controls with Alzheimer's/dementia on expenditures along six services: skilled nursing facility, inpatient acute, physician, home health, hospice, and social services. Cases with dementia were significantly more likely to have home health and hospice expenditures than controls, suggesting potential for the program to improve end-of-life care. Very few cases or controls had any social service expenditures. Social workers should advocate for the expanded role of home-based care for older adults with dementia and for increased Medicare reimbursement of social work services.