In October 2016, Martha Mann began having trouble walking.
After a few weeks in the intensive care unit at Eastside Medical Center in Snellville, Mann transferred to a nursing home to try to rehabilitate her feet. Her legs worked, but her feet were paralyzed.
Mann, 54, stayed in nursing homes for about a year and a half, healing as much as she could, before deciding she wanted to once again live on her own.
Her son did some research online and learned about Money Follows the Person, a federal program administered by the state Division of Aging Services that aims to help those in nursing homes live a more independent life by providing a yearlong budget to use for the transition.
“Transitioning back to being on my own made a huge difference,” Mann said recently. “It was like Jehovah God answered all my prayers.”
Since January, Mann has lived in an apartment in the Villas of Friendly Heights in Decatur. She’s used money from the program to buy a hospital bed and install hardwood floors to make it easier for her to get around in her wheelchair.
Mann is one of 251 people who had been in nursing homes for more than six months that the state Division of Aging Services helped move into homes of their own this fiscal year.
The state-funded program is one of two offered by the division that help people who have been under 24-hour care live independently.
Cheryl Harris, who works on access services for the division, said those who qualify for the programs receive financial help for things including security deposits on new living arrangements, furniture and renovations to make homes more accessible.
Sometimes not having tweaks such as wheelchair ramps or grab bars can prohibit someone from moving back home, Harris said.
She said investing in the programs ends up saving the state money because they’re able to catch patients before they are forced to apply for Medicaid after they’ve spent all their money on expensive nursing homes that could cost $10,000 a month.
Since about 2006, the state has offered the federally funded Money Follows the Person to long-term nursing home patients.
In the current fiscal year, which ends Saturday, the division has spent about $3.3 million on the program. The program is being phased out by the federal government and will soon require patients to receive services through a Medicaid waiver.
As the program winds down, the division is expected to spend about $3.1 million next year.
Each person assisted can receive up to $25,000 for the year to spend on updating his or her home or other services.
Since 2016, the Legislature has also granted the division $1 million each year to operate the Nursing Home Transitions program with a goal of helping 167 people annually. The program allots an average of $1,200 to assist people who have been in nursing homes for 30 days.
“A lot of people are going into nursing homes for a short-term transition before going home,” Harris said.
Heidi Ewen, a professor in the College of Family and Consumer Services at the University of Georgia, said her research shows that people rehabilitate more quickly when they are in their own space. She said it gives people a sense of control and comfort they don’t have in a nursing home.
“It makes more sense to invest money into these programs to get people back into their homes than to build more senior housing,” Ewen said.
Georgia State University professor Jen Craft Morgan, who teaches with the Gerontology Institute, said it’s important that patients are placed in living situations that are affordable and meet their health needs.
“This means having a state that helps the system figure out the lowest cost and appropriate housing and care match for each older adult,” she said.
Susan Cherry received help from the Nursing Home Transitions program in 2016 after being in care for six months to be treated for an infection. Cherry, 65, said she is fortunate to have a sister who cares for her in the home they share in Winston.
The state program paid for a new hospital bed, adult diapers, protein shakes and a new wheelchair.
“I was ready to go home,” Cherry said.
Cherry’s sister, Kitty Black, has called the program a “godsend.”
"When a situation like this comes up, you live and learn all the things that you need and can use that will make your life easier," Black said, "but you can't always afford to get it."
Yas Abdallah, who used the state program for long-term patients to move into the Villas of Friendly Heights in 2012, said living independently helps lift the spirits of those who have been in nursing homes.
Abdallah, who now offers peer-support services through the program, spent three years in a nursing home before moving on his own.
“If you have the opportunity to live, live your life the best you can,” the 61-year-old said.
That was what Wendy Richards, whom Abdallah is helping navigate the program, said she wanted after spending three years in a nursing home with complications from multiple sclerosis.
After being bedridden for the first year and a half, Richards slowly began to regain some mobility. She hopes therapy will help her walk again.
In March, the state program helped her move into the Villas of Friendly Heights.
Richards, 50, now lives in an apartment that’s been updated to suit her needs, including “home automation” technology to let her see who is ringing her doorbell and lock her doors automatically.
“I was in the nursing home going, ‘there is more for me out there than this,’ ” she said.
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