Spousal Impoverishment is a term used to refer to an additional assessment provided to a couple when only one spouse resides in an institution and the other spouse is in the community, and when only one spouse is eligible for Home and Community Based Waiver services and the other is not. The purpose of the provision is to allow the community spouse to keep a share of the resources of the couple. The provision protects a person whose husband or wife goes into an institution or becomes eligible for waiver services from having to deplete all the couple's resources in order for the institutionalized or waiver spouse to qualify for Medicaid.
Assessment of assets is a process of dividing the value of all countable (non exempt) assets that belong to the institutionalized or waiver client and the client's spouse.