Client Advocacy Flashcards

A nursing facility tells a guardian that a person under guardianship must be discharged because the facility will now be paid by Medicaid instead of private funds. What is the guardian's best advocacy response?

Answer: Challenge the discharge, since federal rules generally bar discharge based only on a change to Medicaid payment in a Medicaid-certified facility

Federal nursing home rules limit involuntary discharges to specific reasons, and a Medicaid-certified facility generally can't discharge someone just because their payment source changed to Medicaid.

Which outside resource is set up specifically to investigate and resolve complaints for residents of long-term care facilities?

Answer: The Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program

The Older Americans Act created the Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program to advocate for residents of nursing homes and similar facilities.

A person under guardianship with an intellectual disability is denied a job-coaching service that their plan calls for. Which agency is federally mandated to provide legal advocacy for people with disabilities?

Answer: The Protection and Advocacy (P&A) system

Every state has a federally mandated Protection and Advocacy system that provides legal advocacy for people with disabilities.

The Olmstead v. L.C. decision (1999) supports which advocacy goal for people under guardianship?

Answer: Receiving services in the most integrated setting appropriate to the person's needs

Olmstead held that unjustified segregation of people with disabilities is discrimination under the ADA.

A person under guardianship has a Medicaid home-care service reduced. Under the NGA standards, what is the guardian's first advocacy step?

Answer: File a timely appeal or fair-hearing request and ask that services continue while the appeal is pending

Medicaid recipients have due-process rights to a fair hearing, and benefits can often continue if the appeal is filed within the deadline.

When advocating for a person under guardianship, whose goals should guide the guardian's advocacy first?

Answer: The person's own goals and preferences, as far as they can be known

Person-centered advocacy puts the person's own expressed wishes and values at the center of decisions.

A guardian sees that facility staff often ignore a person's requests to go outside. Which action best shows effective advocacy?

Answer: Document the concerns, raise them with facility management, and escalate to the ombudsman if they aren't resolved

Good advocacy means documenting problems, using internal complaint channels, and escalating to outside bodies when needed.