I'll bet you didn't know this about nursing home care.

I was thumbing through the latest AARP magazine this afternoon, and ran across something both fascinating and frightening. It's on page 93. Here's the question that was asked:

"A nursing home recently sued my friend for $10,000 to pay for her father's end-of-life care. She had signed no papers and had no say in his choices or expenditures--is she responsible?" Here's the answer:


"In 30 states "filial responsibility" laws, while seldom enforced, say that adult children must care for parents who can't aford care for themselves....Some long-term care facilities that can't get payment for services--through the resident's funds of through Medicaid--are turning to the resident's children for restitution. Everyone with a parent in assisted living or a nursing home should understand the laws in the state their parent lives in. Check out the info at aarp.org/filial."

Here are the states WITHOUT filial responsibility laws:ME, NY, SC, FL, AL, MI, WI, MN, IL, MO, NE, KS, OK, TX, WY, CO, NM, WA, AZ, ID, HI.

Any state not listed above DOES have a filial responsibility law.