By Minneapolis Senior Advisor Care Team · October 30, 2026
Minnesota's free statewide aging helpline kept its number but changed its name. Here is what the call actually does for a Twin Cities family, what it cannot do, and why a hospital may file a referral before you ever dial.
The number did not change. The name did.
If someone handed you a card for the Senior LinkAge Line three years ago, that card still works. The phone number is still 800-333-2433. What changed is the name on the door: the service is now called Minnesota Aging Pathways. LeadingAge Minnesota announced the rebrand in an article dated October 2, 2025, noting that the Senior LinkAge Line had been Minnesota's primary aging resource for nearly 30 years before the change.
This matters more than a branding note usually would. Families searching for help under the old name find county pages, church bulletins and hospital discharge packets that still say "Senior LinkAge Line," and families searching the new name find the state site. Both roads lead to the same place. The state's own web address is now mn.gov/aging-pathways, and some provider pages still sit on the old mn.gov/senior-linkage-line path.
The line is answered Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. There is a live chat widget on the state site. The mailing address is 540 Cedar Street, St. Paul, MN 55164, and the published email is [email protected].
It costs nothing. The Minnesota Board on Aging describes it as "a free, statewide service of the Minnesota Board on Aging in partnership with Minnesota's area agencies on aging." There is no income test to call and no requirement that your parent already be on Medicare or Medical Assistance.
Four federal designations sit behind one phone number
Most state helplines are one thing. This one is four, and knowing which hat the person on the phone is wearing tells you how much authority their answer carries. The Board on Aging states that Minnesota Aging Pathways is Minnesota's federally designated long-term care options counseling service, its State Health Insurance Assistance Program (SHIP), its Senior Medicare Patrol (SMP), and its Aging and Disability Resource Center (ADRC).
The SHIP designation is the one most families use without knowing its name. It is why the line can do unbiased Medicare counseling: SHIP counselors are federally funded and are not paid commission on any plan. Trellis, the metro agency that staffs the line here, says its "specialists are trained and certified by the State of Minnesota." If you have been called by someone selling a Medicare Advantage plan and want a second opinion from a person with nothing to sell, this is the number.
The Senior Medicare Patrol hat covers fraud and billing errors — a charge on a Medicare summary notice for equipment nobody ordered, a call demanding a Medicare number. The ADRC hat is the one that makes the line a front door rather than a dead end: an ADRC is supposed to connect you to services across programs rather than only the one you asked about.
The options-counseling designation is the one that matters when a parent is leaving a hospital. It is the legal basis for the conversation about whether a nursing facility is actually necessary, which Minnesota law treats as a required step rather than a courtesy. More on that below.
What the state says the line will help with
The Board on Aging publishes a short list of what Aging Pathways can answer. It is worth reading literally, because it is narrower and more concrete than most help-line descriptions: health insurance counseling, including Medicare, long-term care planning and prescription drug costs; forms assistance, including help applying for Medical Assistance and Medicare Extra Help; long-term care insurance and planning; comparing housing options; connecting with help and services in the community; moving out of a nursing home back into the community; and preadmission screening for nursing facility admissions.
"Forms assistance" is the sleeper item. Families in Hennepin and Ramsey counties routinely stall out on the Medical Assistance application, and the line will walk through it rather than just mail you a link. Medicare Extra Help — the Part D Low Income Subsidy — is the other quiet win; Trellis publishes a testimonial from a caller whose specialist "helped sign me up for the Medicare Part D Low Income Subsidy."
The housing piece is real but limited. Trellis says a housing specialist will help you evaluate your current situation, find services that may be helpful, reduce the need for nursing facility care, and learn about financing options and other resources. That is a conversation about categories and money, not a shortlist of buildings. Nobody on the line will tell you which assisted living community in Richfield is better run than the one in Roseville, and you should be suspicious of anyone who would without looking at the state record first.
If your question is about paying for assisted living specifically, read our breakdown of what Medicaid waivers do and do not cover in assisted living before you call. You will get more out of the forty minutes.
The part most Twin Cities families hit first: preadmission screening
Here is the piece almost nobody explains at the hospital. If a parent is being admitted to a Minnesota nursing facility, a preadmission screening (PAS) has to happen first. The state's language is blunt: "State and federal statutes require preadmission screening (PAS) for all admissions to Medical Assistance (MA)-certified skilled nursing facilities, boarding care facilities and hospital swing beds, regardless of payer source." Private pay does not exempt you.
The screening is not something the family files. Per the state, "a qualified health care professional at a hospital, clinic, hospice or nursing facility must submit an online referral to Minnesota Aging Pathways. Minnesota Aging Pathways will review that referral and if needed, refer it to a county, managed care organization or Tribal Nation." So if your mother is at Abbott Northwestern or Regions and a nursing facility bed is being discussed, a discharge planner is supposed to be filing that referral — and Aging Pathways "may also follow up to offer support with the person's transition home."
What the screening does, in the state's words: it "establishes the need for nursing facility level of care," "connects people with services in the nursing facility and in their return home," and "is required for nursing facility payment." That last clause has teeth. If the payer is Medical Assistance, the state says the facility "will not be paid until the PAS (or, if needed, in-person assessment) has been completed and entered into the state system." The DHS Eligibility Policy Manual is more pointed still: "MA will not pay for nursing facility or certified boarding care services received before the PAS date."
A person may also need an in-person county or Tribal Nation assessment before admission if level of care cannot be determined or the person is under 21, with extra steps when there is a developmental disability or serious mental illness. Providers can submit the referral online 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and can call the line or use chat on the referral site.
The practical lesson for a family in a 72-hour discharge: ask the discharge planner, by name, whether the preadmission screening has been submitted and what the result was. The state tells facilities to "review the PAS final results from Minnesota Aging Pathways or the lead agency before admission" to avoid payment denials. If nobody can answer, that is a flag. Our guide to hospital discharge inside 72 hours at Fairview, Allina and HealthPartners covers the rest of that week.
Where the call leads: the long-term care consultation
The preadmission screening is not a standalone errand. DHS says plainly that "the preadmission screening (PAS) of all people seeking admission to a long-term care facility (LTCF) is a component of the LTCC" — the Long-Term Care Consultation. The LTCC is how level of care gets documented for anyone asking Medical Assistance to pay for long-term care services.
Two sentences in the DHS manual are worth copying into your notes. First: "Upon request, any person with long-term or chronic care needs is entitled to receive LTCC services regardless of their age or eligibility for Minnesota Health Care Programs." You do not have to be poor, or old, or already enrolled, to be entitled to the consultation. Second: "The county where the person is located at the time of request or referral for LTCC services is responsible to provide the LTCC services." Location at the time of the request — not where the deed is, not where the adult child lives.
DHS also lists who may make the referral: "Individuals, families, human services and health professionals, hospital and nursing facility staff." A family can start this. You do not need a hospital to do it for you.
The stated purpose of the consultation is not neutral. It exists to "ensure persons are made aware of available home and community-based options," to "prevent long-term placement of persons in nursing facilities, hospital swing beds and certified boarding care facilities," and to "provide options to persons so they can make informed decisions about where they want to live." The governing citations are Minnesota Statutes, sections 256B.0911 and 256B.0926. If you want the assessment itself walked through step by step, we covered it in the MnCHOICES assessment and long-term care consultation.
This is also the hinge to the Elderly Waiver, which pays for services in the community — including customized living in an assisted living building — but never for room and board.
The metro agency behind the line is one agency for all seven counties
Nationally, the aging network is a patchwork: a metro area is often split between two or three Area Agencies on Aging, and families get bounced. The Twin Cities is not like that. The entire seven-county metro — Anoka, Carver, Dakota, Hennepin, Ramsey, Scott and Washington — is served by a single Area Agency on Aging.
That agency is Trellis, the rebranded successor to the Metropolitan Area Agency on Aging. Its office is at 3001 Broadway Street NE, Suite 601, Minneapolis, MN 55413, and its main number is 651-641-8612. Older directories, county web pages and printed resource guides still say "Metropolitan Area Agency on Aging" or link to metroaging.org. Same organization. Its page states it "is funded in part by the Minnesota Board on Aging under the Older Americans Act."
Two renames stacked on top of each other — the agency became Trellis, then the helpline became Minnesota Aging Pathways — is why this corner of the system feels harder to find than it is. A family in Chanhassen and a family in Forest Lake are calling the same line and are served by the same metro agency, whatever the brochure in their hand says.
Practically: call 800-333-2433 for the options counseling, the Medicare help and the forms. Call 651-641-8612 when you need the metro agency itself — for a presentation to a church group, say, or a question about a locally funded caregiver program. Do not expect either number to resolve county eligibility. Trellis says county offices and managed care organizations decide eligibility, and that it "can refer you to organizations that can help answer your questions."
What the line will not do, and who to call instead
Calling the wrong number costs a Twin Cities family days. Four boundaries are worth knowing before you dial.
It is not abuse reporting. Suspected maltreatment of a vulnerable adult goes to the Minnesota Adult Abuse Reporting Center (MAARC) at 1-844-880-1574, which is statewide and operates around the clock. If someone is in immediate danger, call 911. We walk through the difference in reporting abuse and neglect through MAARC and the ombudsman.
It is not the ombudsman. The Office of Ombudsman for Long-Term Care advocates for residents in disputes with a facility — a discharge you want to fight, a service plan that was cut — and is reachable at 1-800-657-3591. It is a separate office from both Aging Pathways and the Minnesota Department of Health's complaint intake. If you are facing a notice to leave, start with nursing home discharge notices and appeal rights.
It is not facility licensure or complaints. Whether a building holds a Minnesota assisted living facility license — or the dementia care version of it — is an MDH question, and the MDH Office of Health Facility Complaints is at 651-201-4200 in the metro. Check the license before you tour, not after.
It is not the only linkage line. Trellis publishes three siblings: the Veteran's Linkage Line at 888-LinkVet (888-546-5838); Disability Hub MN at 866-333-2466 for someone under 60 with a disability question; and the national Eldercare Locator at 800-677-1116 for services outside Minnesota — the number to use when the parent still lives in another state.
How to make the call worth your forty minutes
The state gives one piece of prep advice, aimed at Medicare open enrollment but good for any call: "Have your list of prescriptions, your medical provider and pharmacy information, your Medicare card and any other insurance information ready when you call." Add to that your parent's date of birth, the county they are physically in right now, and whether they are currently in a hospital or facility.
Then decide which of three calls you are making, because they go to different specialists. A Medicare and drug-cost call. A money-and-eligibility call about Medical Assistance, waivers and forms. Or a what-happens-next call about housing and care options. Saying which one you need in the first thirty seconds saves a transfer.
Write down the name of the person you spoke with and the date. If a preadmission screening or a county referral came out of the call, write down that it was made and by whom. When a county case manager calls three weeks later and nobody can find a record, that note is the whole ballgame.
Timing: late October through early December is the busiest stretch of the year on this line, because Medicare open enrollment runs October 15 to December 7 and the counselors doing plan comparisons are the same people doing options counseling. If your question is not a plan question, January is quieter. If your parent is in a hospital bed today, call anyway — that is what the line is for.
Sources
- Minnesota Aging Pathways - Minnesota Board on Aging
- Minnesota Aging Pathways (state site)
- Preadmission screening - Minnesota Aging Pathways
- DHS Eligibility Policy Manual 2.4.1.1 - MA-LTC Long-Term Care Consultation
- Senior LinkAge Line Is Now Minnesota Aging Pathways - LeadingAge Minnesota
- Minnesota Aging Pathways - Metropolitan Area Agency on Aging (Trellis)
- Minn. Stat. 256B.0911 - Long-term care consultation services
- Minnesota Adult Abuse Reporting Center (MAARC)
- Minnesota Office of Ombudsman for Long-Term Care
