This week’s Globe and Mail contains an interesting article on the possible benefits and down sides of long term care insurance. Many people have no idea such a product exists to help them plan for the uncertainties of old age. Others are operating under the mistaken assumption that the government-funded health care system will cover their care needs as they age.

The article contains an informative juxtaposition of two viewpoints. Stephen Frank, vice president of Canadian Life and Health Insurance Association, presents the arguments in favour of long term care insurance, outlining the important role insurance can play in filling a gap between people’s ability to save for retirement and their potential needs. In contrast, Rona Birenbaum, a financial planner and owner of the organization Caring for Clients, emphasizes the benefits of saving carefully, rather than relying on insurance plans with very high premiums, which may increase over the life of the policy.

We should all be considering and planning for the various health care concerns we might face as we age, and for that reason, this article is recommended reading for everyone.

What the article does not address, however, is the risk that people may responsibly save enough money to cover any care costs required, only to have that money not put to its intended use when they most need it. Estates practitioners often encounter situations involving elderly clients who have saved for retirement, and are well positioned to pay for any care required. However, they are no longer capable of managing their property, and their substitute decision maker – generally acting under a Power of Attorney for Property – is reluctant to sell the family home, or cash in the investments, as required to pay for that care. For the family members of the elderly person, these assets represent a potential inheritance.

See, as just one example, the recent Court of Appeal case of Heston-Cook v. Schneider, 2015 ONCA 10. In this case, one sister, the plaintiff, brought an action against the other sister, the defendant, who had been acting as their deceased mother’s attorney for property before her death. The plaintiff alleged the defendant put her own interests ahead of the deceased’s by maintaining the deceased in her home and not moving her into a nursing home. Under the terms of the deceased’s will, the defendant stood to inherit any home the deceased owned on her death, and it was therefore in her interest to ensure the deceased’s home was not sold to pay for her long term care.

While the defendant may not have had any such self-interested motivations in choosing to keep her mother in her home (the court did not determine this issue), the temptation for some family members is simply too great when they are when faced with a choice between spending their potential future inheritance on an elderly relative’s expensive care, or cutting corners where possible.

In light of such situations, long term care insurance offers one advantage that is not mentioned in the Globe and Mail article: it offers the certainty that, provided the insurer’s conditions are met, long term care will indeed be paid for if needed. People who prefer to save for retirement may wish to consider ensuring their wishes with respect to care, and their intentions with respect to the use of their assets to pay for that care, are documented and well known to their substitute decision makers.