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Question:

My colleague is working with a caregiver who is working to get her mother on Medicaid and moved into a nursing home. Once her mother has moved in, the daughter would like to relinquish her caregiving responsibilities and have a guardian take over. We weren’t sure how best to advise this caregiver.

Response:

It’s difficult to find a non-family guardian in these situations. Almost by definition, since the mother will be on Medicaid, she does not have money to pay a professional guardian. A few states have public guardians who can step into this role. Other states fund non-profit organizations that serve as guardian or conservator, but often their resources are limited. More likely, a probate court would appoint an attorney to fill the role on a pro bono basis. This would be an attorney who also gets more lucrative appointments from the court to balance things out. How that unpaid guardian would fulfill their role is uncertain given that they would be likely to concentrate their time on paying work.

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