Long Term Care Ombudsman

Long Term Care Ombudsman (LTCO) is part of a national network of organizations that advocate for people who use long term care services. This includes consumers receiving care in facilities such as nursing homes, assisted living (also known as residential care) and adult care homes (small group living).

LTCO also helps with concerns related to community-based long term care services such as home health care, home delivered and congregate meals, and hospice care, and billing issues including those related to Medicare and Medicaid.

We are the voice for long term care consumers.

Long Term Care Ombudsman Services:

• Investigating concerns
  Anyone can call LTCO with concerns or complaints related to long term care services. Investigations are handled by trained and certified staff and volunteer ombudsmen and are determined by the client’s needs and interests. The investigations are confidential, and ombudsmen only speak about the concern to others with the client’s (or guardian’s) consent. Ombudsmen utilize negotiation, mediation, education, and advocacy to attempt to resolve the concern.
  In 2010, LTCO handled over 1700 complaints.

• Assisting with choices
  We educate people about long term care services by matching their preferences, care needs and financial resources with long term care facilities and/or community-based services. LTCO uses all public sources for long term care information and only the ombudsman offices have access to complaints that have been verified by the ombudsman program.
  In 2010, LTCO helped more than 670 individuals identify appropriate long term care services.

• Advocating for quality of life
  LTCO Board and staff participate in many local and regional coalitions and advocacy efforts to help promote a better quality of service and quality of life for people receiving long term care services. We believe that by helping one person at a time understand and exercise his or her rights, all people in long term care will benefit.
  LTCO ombudsman work closely with long term care providers to inform, educate, and encourage the delivery of high quality care that meets their consumer’s needs and wishes.
  In 2010, LTCO committed over 1375 hours to advocacy efforts.

Fees:

There are no fees for any of our services. LTCO is funded and supported by:

• Western Reserve Area Agency on Aging – distributes long term care ombudsman funds that come from the federal Older Americans Act and the Ohio Department of Aging.

• Nursing Home Bed Fees – all licensed long term care facilities pay fees each year which are then distributed to area ombudsman programs based on the number of institutional beds in each area. LTCO’s area has approximately 31,350 beds.

• United Way of Greater Cleveland – currently funds LTCO for a special project related to expansion of our Provider Data Base (PDB) of long term care services by adding home health and hospice providers.

• Foundations – LTCO has benefited from grants from several area foundations. These include the Cleveland Foundation, the Abington Foundation, the Mt. Sinai Foundation, the Stocker Foundation, and the Bruening Foundation.

• Individuals & Corporations – generous contributions help LTCO to continue to provide our critical services for the community.

Additional information is available on the LTCO website at www.ltco.org, or call 800-365-3112 or 216-696-2719 or e-mail info@ltco.org.