There’s never a good time to get a critical illness. But there is a bad time. Just ask one of the almost 14,000 Canadians diagnosed with cancer last month.

With all the turbulence in the markets, you are probably wondering about your financial plans. Except those of you who are sick, and you are wondering how you’re going to pay the costs of getting better.

Getting better costs money. There’s the mortgage to pay, lost income, time off work for a spouse, and medical expenses only partially covered by provincial health plans. Things that can set you back thousands and thousands of dollars.

If you thought using some of your RRSP’s would be the answer, are you still comfortable doing that considering the current market and returns of the last few years? Cashing some of them in will make it even more difficult getting your retirement back on track financially. The likelihood is you’ll recover from your illness, the question is will your finances?

There’s never a good time to get a critical illness, but if you are healthy, now is the time to apply for critical illness insurance. A critical illness policy will allow you to focus on what really matters … your recovery.

Here’s an example of how critical illness can help you conserve your retirement income for what it should be used for – the enjoyable years of your retirement.  

Dave is 40 years old and has been an air traffic controller for 18 years. He plans to make an annual $2000 contribution to his RRSP until the age of 65. However, at age 52, he suffers a heart attack. He ceases to make contributions for three years and must withdraw $25,000 from his RRSP to fill the income gap and pay for help at home.

What will happen to Dave’s RRSP?

Value of Dave’s RRSP at age 65 (assuming annual earnings of 7%)                   $61,572

Value of RRSP if Dave did not have to use his savings for his illness                  $135,352

Direct result on Dave’s income at retirement

Difference of Dave’s RRSP post his illness                                                            -$73,780

Decrease in Dave’s annual income for 20 years                                                   -$6,509

A critical illness policy provides you with a lump sum, tax free amount to use however you like if you develop one of the covered illnesses and survive 30 days you receive a lump sum, tax-free amount of money to use any way you choose. That's it!

You choose the amount of coverage you want, how long you want the policy to last (age 65, 75 or for life) and whether you want a simplified program which covers four to five major illnesses or a policy which covers over twenty conditions.

For an additional cost you can also choose to receive all of your premiums back when the policy ends or if you die before the policy expires.

I specialize in living benefits which are simply those policies that pay you while you are living. I focus on critical illness insurance, long term care insurance and disability insurance and work to protect what matters most – your family, your finances and your future.

Tania Stilson ~ UnlimitedLife Advisors

If you have aging parents in need of care, the more money you make the better, right? Nope.

A new study has found that the higher your wage, the less likely you’ll be to spend time helping your folks out. The study, which looked at 2,790 American men and women who had at least one parent or parent-in-law alive in 1998, was conducted by Olena Nizalova of the Kiev Economics Institute.

She found that for every ten per cent rise in their salary, women will spend 36 per cent less time providing care, and men will reduce their input by 18 per cent according to the Telegraph.The findings are to be presented at an upcoming meeting of economics Nobel Laureates in Lindau, Germany.

The care involved household chores, errands and transport. While the report didn’t mention that higher wages may be going toward paid care for elderly parents, it did suggest that, “Involving an elderly person's wider family and friends in their care could also cause their children to more dramatically reduce the amount of time they spend helping out as their earnings rise,” according to the Telegraph.

Recent Canadian research found that most Canadians say they aren't ready to take care of aging parents - emotionally, financially or time-wise.

A Leger survey commissioned by home-care provider We Care Home Health Services found 64 per cent of Canadians say caring for an elder would be overwhelming as they try to balance their own lives, reported Canoe.

Currently, 14.1 per cent of the population is over 65. In another 10 years, that will number will rise to 26.6 per cent, according to Statistics Canada.

A survey last year by the Canadian Medical Association found 80 per cent of Canadians worry the country's health-care system will have problems dealing with record numbers of elderly people, according to the piece.

Do you have aging parents? How do you plan to help care for them?

Found this article interesting regarding the recent decision to downgrade the USA's credit rating as it relates to increased longevity. Interesting to know that throughout 99% percent of all the years that humans have walked the earth, average life expectancy was less than 18 years. Now world wide it's 78 and still rising! Loved the fact that he speaks glowingly about those 65 and better are not a burden on society. Thank you Ken.

Ken Dychtwald, Ph.D – Gerontologist, Author and Public Speaker, Posted 8/14/2011

We stand poised at the edge of history, experiencing a longevity revolution unlike anything the world has ever encountered. And this "age wave" is impacting us in some unexpected ways. One disturbing example is that Standard & Poor's just downgraded America's credit rating, causing an unimaginable loss of money, security and confidence. On the surface it may seem unrelated, a decision based exclusively on the size of our national debt and the unnerving political gridlock in Washington. But look a little closer, and you'll see that it's also a decision based in large part on S&P's biased belief that older adults are a huge financial burden and that they bring nothing positive to the world.

Standard & Poor's Has Decided that Older Adults Will Crush Our Economy

In October 2010, S&P released a report: “Global Aging 2010: An Irreversible Truth.” The very first page of this report states: "No other force is likely to shape the future of national economic health, public finances, and policymaking as the irreversible rate at which the world's population is aging." If you read the entire analysis, you'll see that S&P has determined that older people are a burden on society, a weight... and the more of them there are, the more likely the country will fail.

Over the course of my 35+ year career in gerontology, I have attended more than a thousand meetings, conferences and conventions in which the challenges and opportunities of the emerging new era of aging and longevity have been discussed and debated by top experts in the field. However, prior to the release of this report, I had never once encountered anyone from Standard and Poor's taking part in any of these discussions or even in attendance at any of these events. I guess they believe that they can unilaterally cook up their ideas and proclaim to all the world how the "age wave" should be viewed: negatively.

Let's back up for a moment and reflect on just how remarkable our new "longevity" is, with all its positive potential. Consider one startling fact: Throughout 99 percent of all the years that humans have walked this earth, the average life expectancy at birth was less than 18 years. Infectious diseases, childbirth, accidents, violence, and many other hazards usually brought life to an early close.

Thanks to modern advances in sanitation, public health, food science, pharmacy, surgery, medicine, and, more recently, wellness-oriented lifestyles, our life expectancy has climbed from an average of forty-seven at the beginning of the 20th century, to seventy-eight today -- and it's still rising. In fact, two-thirds of all the people who have ever lived past 65 are alive today. This new era of longevity may very well be humanity's greatest triumph; yet S&P sees only the potential negative implications.

Age Power

I'm not naive enough to believe that the aging of our society is without challenges. But it has its opportunities too. Perhaps the S&P analysts weren't aware that Warren Buffett is considered America's wisest investor at 81, or that Betty White has become one of the most admired and loved comediennes at 89, or that John Glen celebrated his third career by going back up into space at 77 or that Ronald Reagan was 69 when he became the President of the United Sates. Late achievement, while multiplying in frequency, isn't altogether new. Grandma Moses didn't start painting until she was almost 80. George Bernard Shaw was at work on a new play when he died at 94. Galileo published his masterpiece Dialogue Concerning the Two New Sciences at 74. Noah Webster was 70 when he published An American Dictionary of the English Language. Frank Lloyd Wright designed the Guggenheim Museum in New York at 91. Mahatma Gandhi was 72 when he completed successful negotiations with Britain for India's independence. I. M. Pei was 78 when he designed the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland. Picasso painted Rape of the Sabines at eighty-one. Golda Meir was prime minister of Israel from ages 70 to 76. At 94, conductor Leopold Stokowski signed a six-year recording contract. People don't turn 65 and only become a burden on society. Many are huge contributors to the greater good.

Ageism Can Be as Misguided and Damaging as Racism and Sexism

It's obvious that our nation remains somewhat obsessed with youth. Considering the fact that older adults control most of the country's wealth, very few of them can be seen in popular advertising that doesn't have to do with either impotence or incontinence. The entertainment media continues to emphasize a distorted picture of the glory of youth and the irrelevance of maturity (did you know that if you're over 28 you can't even apply to be a contestant on American Idol?). And if you're an unemployed older worker, it can take more than twice as long to secure a job compared to your younger competition. If I step outside my role as a gerontologist and put on my psychologist's hat, it's pretty obvious to me that gerontophobia (the fear of aging and discomfort with the elderly) -- and ageism (a set of beliefs used to justify age-based prejudice) still permeate every facet of our culture.

It wasn't always this way. During Colonial times, our elders were revered for their wisdom and experience. So highly valued was longevity that both men and women often exaggerated their age. Similarly, people actually tried to appear older than they really were -- hiding their natural hair beneath powdered wigs, to enhance the illusion of age. Out of respect, older men and women were given the best seats in town meetings and in the churches. Our "Senate" was even named based on the root word "senex" which means "wise old man" or "sage."

However, with the arrival of industrialization at the end of the 1900s, physical strength trumped lifelong experience and the old were moved to the sidelines while youth took center stage. Many prominent leaders of the time, including Dr. William Osler, one of America and Great Britain's most respected physician-philosophers, voiced this new attitude. In his now infamous 1905 valedictory at Johns Hopkins University, Osler argued that men older than 40 were useless cogs in modern society:

"All the great advances have come from men under 40, so the history of the world shows that a very large proportion of the evils may be traced to the sexagenarians -- nearly all of the great mistakes politically and socially, all of the worst poems, most of the bad pictures, a majority of the bad novels, not a few of the bad sermons and speeches." -- Dr. William Osler

Throughout the decades that I have worked in the field of gerontology, I have happily watched this type of overt ageism diminish with each passing year. But last October, when I received a copy of the S&P "Global Aging" report, I was truly ALARMED to see that S&P had taken ageism to new heights and that they had little regard for any of the social or economic contributions of men and women 65+.

Connecting the Dots: America's Downgrade and S&P's Ageism

A few weeks ago, when Standard & Poor's downgraded the entire U.S. economy, and I watched all of the media coverage, I was shocked that while there was much attention to the political gridlock, no one was connecting the dots to S&P's negative view of the aging of America. What if some, possibly large, factor in their downgrade is their unchallenged belief that older adults are essentially a "burden" -- that your mom and dad (and in the years ahead -- you) have absolutely nothing useful to contribute to society and that their presence is a purely negative drain on our economy and overall well-being as a country?

Imagine how we'd react if S&P had downgraded America based on the number of Christians in our society, or Hispanics, or African Americans or Jews. We'd be outraged and wouldn't stand for it. And we shouldn't let their aging-burden-downgrade remain unchallenged either!

Bill Curry - Globe & Mail, printed August 2011

The debate over Canada’s demographics is poised to heat up this fall as the Parliamentary Budget Office prepares the release of a wide-ranging study of what an aging population means for Ottawa’s bottom line.

Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page caused a stir in February 2010 when he first looked at the issue, warning that part of the federal deficit is structural -- or permanent -- and will not be erased over the long term unless Ottawa cuts more deeply or starts bringing in more tax revenue.

Bill Curry, Globe and Mail - published August 2011

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty and the highest levels of the public service are immersed in a flurry of closed-door talks aimed at tackling the rising costs of health care and retirement benefits in the face of a shrinking number of working-age taxpayers available to foot the bill.

Internal government documents obtained by The Globe and Mail show Canada’s aging population is no longer a problem on the horizon, but rather one that will impact the federal government this year. It's a challenge Ottawa is now discussing more openly and with added urgency.

Interesting article appearing in the Globe and Mail. What's even more interesting are the comments from G&M readers that appeared. At least people are starting to talk about the issues. ~ Tania


Karen Howlett of Globe and Mail –Published July 2011

Canada’s health-care providers are struggling to retool the system to meet the needs of an aging population that is often facing multiple, chronic medical conditions.

The phenomenon of the growing ranks of the frail elderly in need of different phases of care that often can be provided in the community did not exist 25 years ago. Yet the country’s health-care system remains mired in the 1950s, primarily focused on hospitals and with little in the way of community services to prevent the elderly from languishing in acute-care beds.

What Canada needs is an actual health-care system, one that makes navigating between hospital and back into the community as seamless as possible for patients, said Kevin Smith, chief executive officer of St. Joseph’s Health System in Hamilton, Ont.

“If you have one thing wrong with you, we don’t do a bad job,” Dr. Smith said. “If you have complex, multiple issues, the system is not a system.”

With little leadership out of Ottawa and budget constraints in provincial capitals, it is largely falling to health-care executives to find ways to care for seniors while keeping them from congesting primary-care centres.

In Toronto, one in every 10 acute-care beds is occupied by an elderly patient who has nowhere else to go. Nationally, the situation is just as bleak. Patients who no longer need acute care account for more than 1.7 million hospital days a year, according to a 2009 study by the Canadian Institute for Health Information.

“If hospitals are to achieve their current goals, they need to look outside their four walls,” said Bob Bell, chief executive officer of University Health Network.

St. Joseph’s has done just that. It is on the leading edge of a vertical integration trend to bring different types of health-care services under one roof, so that practitioners no longer operate in their own silos. As part of a corporate restructuring – the first of its kind in Ontario – St. Joseph’s services span home care, long-term care, complex continuing care, rehabilitation, hospice and traditional acute care through its two hospitals.

With the restructuring, St. Joseph’s can better co-ordinate primary health care through its acute-care hospitals in Hamilton and Kitchener with all other aspects of institutional and community-based care in Southern Ontario. Not only can it do so more cost effectively, Dr. Smith said, patients can be served in the most appropriate setting.

In earlier days, family doctors often helped patients navigate the system, he said. But with Canadians getting older and sicker, this is no longer possible. A better model is needed, he said, for the frail elderly patients who are battling diabetes, heart disease and possibly early dementia, and don’t want to tell their story all over again when they make the transition from one care provider to another.

“A system that isn’t more responsive to patients with multiple needs will not meet the needs of the future,” Dr. Smith said.

With the proportion of Canadians who are seniors increasing, the future is rapidly approaching. Fourteen per cent of the population is older than 65 and that will rise to 23 per cent over the next 15 years.

These changing demographics are putting enormous strains on family doctors as patients with complex conditions consume more and more of their time. Yet Canada lags behind other countries, notably the United States, in using case managers who can co-ordinate care in the community for elderly patients, often leaving doctors and family members to pick up the slack.

“We’re getting to the point where the capacity of the system as it has existed is being strained to the limit because of the changes in demographics,” said University of Alberta professor and health policy researcher John Church.

Health-care providers are taking steps to reform the system. In another example of vertical integration, this time aimed at helping to free up beds, hospitals in Toronto are partnering with rehabilitation centres. University Health Network has joined forces with Toronto Rehabilitation Institute, Canada’s largest such facility. The institute treats patients from the city’s seven largest hospitals, including the three that comprise UHN. Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre is also in merger talks with St. John’s Rehab Hospital.

In British Columbia, the Fraser Health Authority is putting acute and community care services under the same umbrella by having primary care doctors’ partner with home health workers. The home health worker assumes responsibility for the doctor’s patients once they return to the community.

Alberta is following the lead of British Columbia, Saskatchewan and New Brunswick by trying to prevent seniors who do not need emergency care from ending up in the hospital. The province’s Emergency Medical Services is working in collaboration with hospitals in Edmonton and Calgary to find resources in the community for patients who have chronic illnesses or disabilities but who do not need to be in an acute-care bed.

But the Alberta government’s effort to clear the bottleneck in hospitals is undermined somewhat by its push to have the private sector provide additional long-term care homes. Private operators charge much higher rates for room and board than the province. Patients who cannot afford the higher prices could languish longer in the hospital, critics say.

Overall reforms in Canada will be piecemeal unless the federal and provincial governments make community and home care an integral part of the country’s universal medicare system, say health-care experts. What’s more, they say, changing the focus from acute care to continuing care has the added appeal for cash-strapped governments of potentially lowering costs.

A new report calls for an integrated system of care delivery to provide lower cost, seamless care for seniors across a wide range of services. The services would be under one roof with a single budget and co-ordinated by case managers who can assess a patient’s needs, develop customized care plans and authorize access to services.

“What we actually are doing is substituting more expensive hospital care for less expensive non-professional home support care,” said Marcus Hollander, a Victoria-based health-policy researcher and co-author of the report.

In fact, an earlier study done by Prof. Hollander found that withdrawing support services such as housecleaning to help elderly people function in their own homes ended up costing the health-care system more.

British Columbia at one time provided housecleaning, cooking and other services to the elderly. But in the mid-1990s, some regions in the province stopped funding these services. People who were cut off from these services cost the health-care system an average of $3,500 more compared with those who continued receiving help, the study concluded. The health of many individuals who no longer received the help deteriorated and they ended up in hospital or a long-term care home.

“The tragic thing about this is we actually had systems of care like this in Canada in the late ’80s and early ’90s, and then there were changes in policy and budget crunches and things kind of withered away,” Prof. Hollander said.

Dr. Smith is well aware that the missing link to providing a continuum of care for seniors is assisting the elderly who can manage on their own with a little help.

“We don’t have well-thought-out strategies on the senior who doesn’t need long-term care, but who needs a supportive housing environment,” he said.