"Preserving the Ability to Remain Safely in Your Home"

Making a Decision

Finally the decision is made, find caregiver resources for the home.

In-Home care is available 1 to 24 hours a day. A trained caregiver in the home can reduce the family's burden of care. Often the introduction of a trained caregiver in the home lessens the frail senior's (misplaced) feelings of guilt for becoming a "burden" to the family. Family members are better able to disentangle their emotional feelings for their loved one from feelings of "duty" required by their caregiving roles

With people's evolving views of the value of death with dignity and the recognition of the limitations of heroic interventions that keep people alive at the cost of the quality of life, people are increasingly choosing to stay in their homes as long as possible and often until death. In many cases, in-home care provided by trained caregivers, allows a senior to remain at home with dignity until their death. Again the virtues of the familiar place, the ease with which family members can visit, and the healthy environment provided by one's home environment are increasingly valued in our society.

Individuals and families seeking in-home caregiving services are then faced with many agonizing decisions.

• Where do I find a caregiver?
• How do I know they are competent?
• Will they treat my loved one with care and empathy?
• How do I know they are responsible and trustworthy?
• How will they be supervised?
• What if the caregiver becomes ill?

In order to benefit from the opportunity of in-home care, a family needs to feel confident with the answers to these questions.

Our goal at Amdal In-Home Care is to make you comfortable with the answers to all of these questions and exceed your expectations in every way.

Once a decision has been made to seek additional paid help to care for a loved one at home, a question often arises, "Should I try to find a caregiver myself, or contract with an agency who will provide someone?"

Before this question can be answered, it is useful to identify the "Job Description" required to safely and effectively employ someone in the home. Whether one decides to hire directly and personally fulfill the job description or whether an Agency is hired to fulfill the job description - the tasks remain the same. A job description appears below.

Job Description to hire a caregiver to provide home care:

Initial Tasks

• Accurately assess the needs of the client
• Find caregivers through advertisements in the local newspapers or rely on word of mouth
• Select, Hire and administer caregivers
• Interview candidates
• Check references and test competencies
• Structure the employment arrangement
• Establish sick leave, vacation policy
• Check immigration status
• Confirm transportation to clients home
• Hire caregiver
• Procure workman's compensation insurance for caregiver

Ongoing Responsibilities

• Establish backup procedures if caregiver is ill
• Train caregiver in techniques to care for client, update as necessary
• Make appropriate employment filings with IRS including payroll deduction administration
• If the service is covered by a long-term care insurance policy, bill and administer reimbursement

Hiring Privately

This option calls for the family to perform all of the functions listed in the above job description.

The only advantage to hiring privately is; by spending money and time performing the above tasks, a family can pay a reduced hourly rate to the caregiver.

Hiring privately saves money in the short term but may be costly over the longer term. The major risks to hiring directly arise from incompletely or incompetently fulfilling the job description above. There are state and federal laws, which govern employee/employer relationships which incorporate real sanctions and penalties for failure to adhere to certain laws. There are also risks to employing a caregiver on a loose or casual basis: in an increasingly litigious society, many families are finding that a beloved caregiver can become a litigant if the relationship isn't handled professionally.

In addition, there are risks associated with hiring directly apart from incompletely fulfilling the job description above, including the potential vulnerability that arises when running advertisements for help in the local newspaper and bringing strangers to ones home during the selection process.

Employing an Agency

An agency's goal is to provide the family with peace of mind through fulfilling all aspects of the job description above. Employees have been carefully screened and tested for appropriate skills. All references have been checked. Most agencies carry liability and a surety bond. Which are protections from injury or theft. Federal and state tax liabilities are taken care of. Workman comp coverage is provided.

Agencies provide on-going education and training to ensure the highest quality of professional standards is maintained. The agency takes the responsibility of having a caregiver at the home including replacement when necessary. The agency will also create the plan of care that needs to be followed while the employee is in the home. There are ongoing supervisory visits to maintain standards.

Many people are recognizing the value of long term care insurance, which often has a home care benefit. Most insurance companies who provide coverage for home care aides prefer to do business with an agency.

Finally, agencies provide the security of having professionals in all of the issues of home care on-call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This provides a comfort for the client and family members that are at a distance.