Glossary of the vertical

The six basic self-care tasks used in the functional test for this vertical: washing, dressing, feeding, toileting, transferring and mobility. Each is scored on whether the person can perform it, with or without significant assistance. ADLs are not a diagnosis list and they are not a measure of household effort.

A maximum amount a scheme will still pay in a defined twelve-month window, usually for items or training rather than for a lifetime payout. Once the cap is used, further claims wait for the next period or are paid by the household. An annual cap is not reset by a change in ADL count.

The estimated annual rent of a property as used in Singapore property tax. In this vertical, AV is the fallback means measure for households with no income. It is not cash received. A household in a dwelling with a high AV can sit in a less-subsidised band even though no wages are coming in.

The professional authorised by a scheme to complete a Functional Assessment Report. Schemes name the professions and sometimes the organisations they will accept. A regular attending doctor is not automatically an assessor for CareShield Life or ElderShield unless that scheme’s list says so. Using an unauthorised assessor is a common reason a clinically obvious case is still rejected.

The person whose function, residency and, where relevant, age and cohort are being tested. Grants and payouts attach to this person even when a caregiver is the one filling the form. Mixing up care recipient and caregiver on a payee field delays disbursement.

The person providing care, or named as such on a grant. The Home Caregiving Grant and the Caregivers Training Grant care about this identity. CareShield Life does not pay “because someone is a caregiver”; it pays because the care recipient meets severe disability. A foreign domestic worker may be the person doing the work and still not be the grant’s named caregiver, depending on the current rule.

Long-term care delivered in a centre that the person attends and then leaves, such as day care, dementia day care or community rehabilitation. Means-tested subsidies for centre-based care use the household outcome read against the centre-based table, not the residential-care table. It is not a nursing home.

The act of filing a complete pack through the channel the scheme names: insurer, Board, agency or approved provider. Lodgement is what starts the scheme’s own clock. A telephone enquiry, a clinic letter, or a pack left with an unauthorised office is not lodgement.

A rule that assigns people to a scheme by year of birth, by the date a national programme opened, or by whether they were already disabled at entry. Cohort rules explain why CareShield Life, ElderShield and IDAPE are not free substitutes. Two people with the same ADL profile can be in different cash schemes solely because of cohort.

The amount left on a provider’s bill after a means-tested subsidy has been applied. It is not the gross fee, and it is not a cash grant. Insurance payouts do not automatically reduce the co-payment line unless a separate arrangement with that provider exists.

The structured scoring of ADLs (and, on some forms, related function) by an authorised assessor. The product is a Functional Assessment Report. The assessment answers “what can the person do on a usual day”, not “what disease do they have”. Several schemes reuse one report; some insist on their own form even when the findings match.

Long-term care services delivered in the dwelling: home personal care, home nursing, home therapy and related packages. Means-tested subsidies for home care are bill-level. They are a different table from centre-based and residential care, and they are a different instrument from the Home Caregiving Grant, which is cash.

In this vertical, the standing residual cash programme for older people with severe disability who sit outside CareShield Life and ElderShield — IDAPE. “Interim” is part of the programme’s name, not a promise that a better insurance product will follow automatically. IDAPE still uses a means test the insurance schemes do not use.

Care for people who need ongoing help because of functional dependence, delivered at home, in a centre, or in a residential facility. On this desk, LTC financing means the nine schemes in scope. It does not mean acute hospital treatment, and it does not mean every social payment available to seniors.

The band issued after the household test. Providers and grant administrators read this band to set a subsidy tier or a grant amount. The outcome has a validity period. It is not a lifetime status and it is not a clinical document. An expired outcome can change the next invoice without any change in the care recipient’s ADLs.

The date from which a cash scheme begins to pay. It is defined by the scheme’s rules and may differ from the assessment date and from the lodgement date. A first payment that looks short is often a proration from commencement, not an underpayment of the monthly quantum.

Counted household income divided by the number of members the scheme counts in that household. PCHI is the main means figure in this vertical. Who is in the household, and which receipts are income, are defined on the current declaration. PCHI is not take-home pay of the caregiver alone.

The ability to take a current means-test outcome to a new approved provider or, sometimes, to a new service type. Portability still needs paperwork. A new provider who has not loaded the outcome will bill as if it did not exist. Changing from home to residential care can change the table even when the outcome itself travels.

A later functional assessment used to confirm that severe disability, or another clinical threshold, still holds. Payout schemes can require it. Improvement in function can stop a payout. Re-assessment is not a means test, and a means-test refresh is not a re-assessment.

Long-term care in an approved nursing home or similar residential facility. Subsidies are bill-level and use the residential table. Moving into residential care often ends the Home Caregiving Grant because the living arrangement is no longer “home”. It does not, by itself, end CareShield Life.

In this vertical, the usual clinical threshold is the need for significant assistance in at least three of the six ADLs. The phrase is a scheme definition, not a conversational description of how hard life feels. Meeting it on a Functional Assessment Report is what opens CareShield Life, ElderShield, MediSave Care and several grants. It is not a master key for SMF or home adaptation.

The slice of a means-test table that corresponds to a PCHI or AV range. The tier is what a provider converts into a subsidy percentage or a grant amount for that service in that year. Tiers for home, centre and residential care are related and not identical. Quoting a relative’s tier without naming the service type is how numbers go wrong.