Posted by Linda Lee on February 16th, 2010 at 6:07 pm | 4 Comments »
Linda Lee
The Washington state legislature is finally starting to support the work we home care workers and our allies have been doing to establish a professional career path for direct care workers in long-term care. On Saturday, a bill to allow home care workers to more easily become nursing assistants was passed out of committee. It will soon be voted on by the state Senate.
The House bill, HB 2766, and the Senate’s, SB 6582, are nearly identical. A third bill, SB 6662, is slightly different and more inclusive of other types of workers. None of the three have funding attached, so they will only be effective if my union, SEIU 775, can negotiate money for our joint Training Trust.
The cynical part of me says it’s about time the legislature recognized the work we home care aides have been doing to improve the quality of care we provide, but the optimistic part is happy for this good news. Continue reading »
Posted by Helen Hanson on February 11th, 2010 at 4:45 pm | 3 Comments »
Helen Hanson
Well, our report is complete, but it has not yet been presented to the Legislature.
As you know if you’ve been reading this blog, I am part of a team that was appointed by the state of Maine to recommend ways that the Legislature’s Health and Human Services Committee could streamline long-term care service delivery, address equalities in the services provided, and hopefully gain some cost savings, which can be passed on to workers in the form of livable wages and benefits such as paid time off and health care coverage. We finished our work in early January, and the report was supposed to be released later that month.
But I just learned that the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) has put it on the back burner instead. Continue reading »
Posted by Tracy Dudzinski on January 7th, 2010 at 3:58 pm | No Comments »
Application form and details
This spring, the DCA’s Voices Institute will introduce a state-level training program for people who want to improve the lives of direct support workers and the people they support. If you’re a direct support worker or a long-term care recipient in Wisconsin who has a passion for that cause, we’d love to see you there!
Advocacy Voices Together is sponsored by the Direct Care Alliance, the Wisconsin Board for People with Developmental Disabilities (WBPDD), and the Wisconsin Direct Caregiver Alliance (WIDCA). The program teams direct support workers with people who receive long-term care services. Together, they will learn how to build support for better direct care worker wages, benefits and working conditions. Continue reading »
Posted by David Ward on December 30th, 2009 at 6:46 pm | No Comments »
David Ward
The Direct Care Alliance thanks the Senate for passing its version of the health care reform bill, The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, on Christmas Eve.
This is another big step toward ensuring that health care is affordable for millions of currently uninsured Americans – including hundreds of thousands of direct care workers. As the advocacy voice for more than three million direct care workers, we are excited to see our government so close to guaranteeing affordable, quality health insurance for all Americans.
Both the House and Senate are now working to merge the two bills. Once both chambers of Congress pass a single health care reform bill, the President will either sign the bill into law or veto the bill and return it to Congress.
We are also grateful to all of our constituents and allies who have already contacted their representatives to urge them to pass this bill. Please continue to tell your representatives why health care reform matters to you and why it is important that they pass the final version of the bill. To locate your senators and members of Congress, call the Capitol switchboard at 202-224-3121.
David Ward
Director of Policy and Planning
Direct Care Alliance
Posted by David Ward on December 22nd, 2009 at 10:13 pm | 1 Comment »
David Ward
This past Saturday we learned that senate lawmakers failed to include the direct care workforce amendment (PDF) championed by Senators Robert Casey, Herb Kohl, and Russ Feingold in Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-NV) manager’s amendment (PDF) to the Senate version of the health care reform bill. The Senate is expected to vote on the health care reform bill at 8 a.m. tomorrow morning, Christmas Eve Day. The bill is widely expected to be approved by the chamber.
We are pleased that Senate bill includes a number of key benefits for direct care workers and their families, including expanded choice and access to affordable health insurance coverage, increased training and education opportunities, and Community Living and Supportive Services (CLASS) Plan provisions.
However, we are disappointed at the Senate’s failure to include the Casey-Kohl-Feingold amendment to ensure that the direct care workforce is a “high priority” focus area of the National Healthcare Workforce Commission that would be established under the senate health care reform bill. The goal of the commission is to gather and review information on the nation’s health care workforce, providing comprehensive recommendations to Congress and the Administration on ways to strengthen this workforce. Continue reading »
Posted by Helen Hanson on December 22nd, 2009 at 7:04 pm | No Comments »
Helen Hanson
Update: We did it! The Senate passed its version of the health care reform bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, on December 24.
As a direct care worker working with a quadreplegic in her home, I receive no health care benefits. I help this lady maintain her independence by providing personal care, dressing her, and doing the other things she cannot do for herself, things that people without disabilities take for granted.
It is a shame that such a noble profession – helping people maintain their independence and dignity – carries no health care benefit. So many of us direct care workers provide health care without being able to obtain affordable coverage ourselves.
The Senate is planning to vote on health care reform this Thursday, before the Christmas break. Before they vote, our senators need to hear from direct care workers. They need to hear what it is like to do this kind of work and not have any health care benefit themselves.
I urge workers who support reform to call their senators and tell them we need health care reform. The last time anyone tried to fix health care was during the early years of the Clinton administration, when my 18-year-old daughter was just a baby. We cannot wait until I’m a grandmother – or later – to fix our broken health care system. We need to make things better now, while we have the chance.
Please call Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid at 202-224-3542 to ask him to support health care reform. Also call the Capitol switchboard at 202-224-3121 to locate your senator and ask him or her to do the same.
Helen Hanson
Home Care Worker
Graduate, 2009 Voices Institute National Leadership Program
Posted by Lindsay Short on December 21st, 2009 at 9:20 pm | No Comments »
Lindsay Short
I am honored to have been elected president of the Direct Support Professional Association of Minnesota as of next year.
Being a part of DSPAM over the last two years has been an eye-opening, life-changing experience. I’ve had the opportunity to work with amazing people on the DSPAM board of directors, and I’ve watched DSPAM turn into an amazing organization, overcoming many milestones and accomplishing many of its goals.
Continue reading »
Posted by Elise Nakhnikian on December 11th, 2009 at 10:52 am | 8 Comments »
The Direct Care Alliance has asked Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to support a direct care worker amendment to the Senate’s version of the health care reform bill. The amendment calls for including the direct care workforce as a “high priority” focus area for the National Health Care Workforce Commission.
In a December 15 letter (PDF), the DCA and 35 other organizations asked Senator Reid to include the amendment in the final version of the Senate’s health care reform bill. Five more organizations joined the list of endorsers (PDF) after the letter was sent.
Sponsored by Senators Robert Casey (D-PA) and Herb Kohl (D-WI), the amendment would add direct care workers to the list of health care workers to be studied by a National Healthcare Workforce Commission to be created under the Patient Protection and Affordable Choices Act. This no-cost amendment will ensure that the commission will review current and projected needs involving the direct care workforce, providing comprehensive recommendations to Congress and the Administration on how best to align direct care workforce resources with our national needs.
Posted by Leonila Vega on December 6th, 2009 at 9:07 pm | 2 Comments »
Leonila Vega
Thanks to the leadership of Senators Robert Casey [PA] and Herb Kohl [WI], a direct care worker amendment (PDF) has been filed to the Senate health care reform bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The amendment adds the direct care workforce as a “high priority” focus area of the National Health Care Workforce Commission. The commission would examine a number of key health care workforce issues, as part of the bill’s effort to expand access to millions of uninsured Americans, but the current list of health care professions to be studied does not include direct care workers.
Tracy Dudzinsky, a graduate of the DCA’s Voices Institute National Leadership Program and president of the Wisconsin Direct Caregiver Alliance, led the charge in getting this amendment introduced when she visited Senator Feingold’s office in September.
Tracy was helped early on by fellow direct care worker and Voices Institute NLP graduate Brenda Nachtway, who asked Senator Casey to support the direct care worker amendment. Instead, Senator Casey went above and beyond Brenda’s request and offered to sponsor the amendment!
Continue reading »
Posted by Elise Nakhnikian on November 25th, 2009 at 7:55 am | 4 Comments »
Helen Hanson
PHI’s Health Care for Health Care Workers initiative has issued two new resources for people working to improve health care coverage for direct care workers.
Health Care Coverage for Direct-Care Workers: 2008 Update, (pdf) a brief overview of the most recent available federal data on health care coverage among direct care workers, finds that direct-care workers continued to have considerably higher rates of uninsurance than the general public under 65 years of age (26.1 percent vs. 17.3 percent) in 2008. “If direct-care workers are to rely on employer-sponsored coverage, policy makers must establish effective payment methods that build the cost of health coverage into the reimbursement rates that eldercare and disability service providers receive,” the three-page report concludes.
The other resource is a series of testimonials from five direct care workers and one employer about how they have been affected by inadequate health insurance. The first two are from graduates of the Voices Institute’s National Leadership Program: home care worker Helen Hanson and CNA Cindy Ramer.
