PLAN Services Planning     Lifelong Assistance Help to Determine Ways to Finance the Plan In general, PLAN offers long term planning and coordination of services that enhance the quality of life for a person with disabilities over his/her lifetime. The Long Term Plan of Care outlines what types of services are to be arranged for or provided, how often they should be offered, and when they should start. Services are customized to fit individual and family needs, and care plans build in support to compensate for decreased family involvement over time. Basically, anything a family member provides someone with disabilities, PLAN can provide as well. Things families normally provide their disabled loved one can be assumed by PLAN as part of a long term plan of care to provide consistency and quality over that person's lifetime. PLAN provide families and individuals three key services: I. Planning Whether short or long term in nature, PLAN helps families and individuals create a blueprint for the future. PLAN provides both a vehicle for planning and assistance with planning such that individual needs, family preferences, public service provision, and current state entitlement laws become parts of a larger vision of care for a person's future. PLAN offers a comprehensive planning document that can help families and individuals detail what's important to them now, and what may be important or of concern in the future. We offer professional assistance with planning as well, by offering suggestions, guidance, and resource information that can strengthen the plan for the future. Back to top. II. Lifelong Assistance PLAN not only helps individuals and families create care plans, they commit to coordinating such plans for the future. In this way, PLAN aims to become a sort of family surrogate member for a person with disabilities, a surrogate who has an established relationship with that person, a coherent vision of his/her ideas about the future, and detailed knowledge his/her current issues. PLAN sees that the plan is implemented as written, changed as needed, and updated regularly. In coordinating the plan long term, PLAN assumes a family surrogate role for a person with disabilities, interacting with that person now to establish solid rapport and assist with current difficulties, and continually building a trusting relationship that ensures we'll be able to help in the future as planned (essentially, providing life long assistance in a highly personal way). Back to top. III. Help to Determine Ways to Finance the Plan PLAN offers basic information regarding legal and financial planning for people with disabilities, and consultation with those specifically involved in a family's estate planning. PLAN also offers referrals to attorneys and financial planners who work in elder law, particularly with special needs and discretionary trusts that can finance items to enhance the quality of a disabled person's life while preserving his/her eligibility for Medicaid and other government entitlements. Back to top. ©2005 PLAN of Southwest Ohio, Inc. 11223 Cornell Park Dr., Cincinnati, OH 45242 (513)821-6111 or (513)496-1195 (fax) E-Mail: planofsouthwestoh@fuse.net