Although the number of Californians living with Alzheimer’s will nearly double to 1.1 million within twenty years, those in rural and remote areas face major challenges to accessing care.
Compared to urban communities, these rural Californians struggle to access preventative services, including screenings, diagnostic care, clinical visits, and appointments with specialists. Long wait times and a lack of public transportation are also common issues.
“Our own research on access barriers to Medicaid, the largest payer of long-term U.S. care access, has involved over 40 focus groups and over 100 individual interviews,” said Hagar Dickman, senior attorney at Justice in Aging. “We found, statewide, that low-income individuals with mid-to-late Alzheimer’s and dementia, particularly in rural areas, generally have no options to access community or personal care programs.”
