Posted by David Moreau on January 31st, 2010 at 3:33 pm | 2 Comments »
David Moreau
In Social Awareness Sophie’s asked
If you could change any part of yourself
what would it be? and she thinks very carefully.
The staff are good at this one.
Each participant’s annual meeting
starts with Strengths, which we skip
over quickly and Needs, which we use
to make hab plans, such as, Donnie will refrain
from talking to people he doesn’t know
on ninety percent of recorded occasions
for three consecutive months, or,
Sophie will report to group on time…. Continue reading »
Posted by Elise Nakhnikian on January 31st, 2010 at 3:06 pm | No Comments »
Marilyn Daniel helps Classie Morant (L) prepare for her sister's funeral.
In two moving multimedia presentations that meld photos and captions with spoken memories, the Washington Post has fleshed out the story of the elderly sisters introduced in an earlier feature. Marilyn Daniel’s Reward brought to life the importance of direct care work through telling the story of Daniel, a compassionate home health aide. One of her clients was Rozzie Laney, who passed away at the age of 92. Rozzie’s primary caregiver was her 104-year-old sister, Clarice “Classie” Morant.
No Greater Love shows how Classie took care of her sister during her last days. Sweet Dreams is about Rozzie’s death, on New Year’s Eve 2008.
Posted by Judy Clinco on January 29th, 2010 at 3:49 pm | 1 Comment »
Judy Clinco
It’s not easy to start up a direct care worker association, but with the right members and allies, you’d be surprised how much you can get done.
Our association, the Arizona Direct Care Worker Association (ADCWA), started last year. We are still in the process of building up our membership, but we already have some really powerful advocates for their profession. And we have a plan for the year, which we’re all working hard to implement.
After the DCA’s Vera Salter did a Power Me workshop for us last summer, we invited all the association members who attended the workshop to become part of a leadership circle. Six of them did, and they’ve gotten a lot done in the last six months. Continue reading »
Posted by Paul Tripoli on January 15th, 2010 at 1:43 pm | No Comments »
Paul Tripoli
On the surface, the work performed by direct care workers can be viewed as providing consumers with basic needs: bathing, grooming and other activities of daily living. However, at the deepest level, direct care workers touch the heart of the human being. The emotional component and impact of their work can be profound, as the people they care for — like the caregivers themselves – have a need for self-expression and a need to relate to others.
Transference
In a counseling therapy setting, therapists and their clients often experience what is known as transference and counter-transference, when one of them projects feelings from past relationships onto the other. Transference can lead to a client having romantic feelings for a therapist.
The same process can happen between a direct care worker and someone he or she assists. As Lisa Marie Hilz writes in Transference and Counter-Transference, transference “evolves from unresolved or unsatisfactory…experiences in relationships with parents or other important figures…. This may precipitate behavioral and thought patterns in subsequent relationships, even though certain actions and attitudes may be inappropriate for the current interaction…. As nurses generally have the most consistent and frequent contact with patients as compared with other disciplines, the potential for nurses to be objects of transference is significant.” Continue reading »
Posted by Helen Hanson on January 15th, 2010 at 12:12 pm | No Comments »
A planning session with (L to R) Vicki Purgavie of Home Care & Hospice Alliance, Diana Scully and Doreen McDaniel from DHHS, me, Leo Delicata of Legal Services for the Elderly, and Louise Olsen from the University of Southern Maine, Muskie School
As I explained in an earlier blog post, Maine is putting four pieces of legislation that would affect the home- and community-based part of Maine’s long-term care system — including its direct care workers – through a LEAN process. The aim of the process is to make service delivery more efficient, address inequalities 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’ve made a lot of progress toward that goal in the last few weeks.
Two direct care workers, Julie Moulton and I, were appointed to the core team that will lead the process of coming up with a plan for a streamlined system. Another direct care worker, Cathy Bouchard, became an alternate, stepping up when Julie was unable to stay on the team. I am also part of a Direct Care Workers’ Task Force that was put together to recommend changes for the issues directly affecting home care workers. This is the first time workers have been involved at this high a level of working on system change in Maine. 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 Mike Harrison on November 25th, 2009 at 7:57 am | 1 Comment »
Mike Harrison
My name is Mike Harrison. I am a displaced factory worker who has found refuge in the direct care workforce.
I do what is called “in-home care” for a single quadriplegic client in his residence. It took me over two years to get the seniority to schedule myself for 40 hours a week. That leaves me 8 hours’ leeway to do emergency fill-in without accruing overtime, which my agency will pay but highly discourages. I am very fortunate to get this benefit, which I will expound on later.
In my job as a DSP (direct support professional), I cook, clean, shop, wet nurse, bathe, and take care of his dog. Basically, I fill in the gaps his spinal muscular condition creates. It’s a pleasure and a privilege to support my client, who is one of the smartest, most driven people I know. I strive to support his independent living and provide some dignity to an otherwise difficult situation.
There are many problems in the direct care world that I am immune to. My wife’s health care benefits from her job are superior and less expensive then the plan offered by agency. Without that option, I’d have to take the less desirable plan or seek another job that offers a better benefit package. Many of my colleagues across the country have no health plan offered, leaving them sick from not seeking treatment to running the risk of financial ruin by paying for pricey medical treatment. Fifty percent of the bankruptcies in this country are caused by medical bills. Continue reading »
Posted by Elise Nakhnikian on November 25th, 2009 at 4:12 am | No Comments »
Direct care workers and others who care about providing high-quality care may want to take advantage of the free membership drive at NCCNHR: the National Consumer Voice for Quality Long-Term Care. Anyone who was not a member of NCCNHR in 2008 or 2009 can join free of charge through the end of this year. The free memberships will be good from January 1 through December 31, 2010.
The person who refers the most new members to NCCNHR will receive a complimentary registration to the group’s conference next year.
Posted by Elise Nakhnikian on November 11th, 2009 at 4:05 pm | No Comments »
Next time someone asks you how to find a good home care worker, you might try referring them to this article.
Written by care recipient Laura Hershey for the Disaboom Network, an online resource for people with disabilities, the article is a realistic and respectful collection of tips on how to attract and keep a caregiver. In addition to discussing where to place ads and how to word them, Hershey recommends that employers pay well if possible and offer regular raises.
She also recommends advocating for better wages, health care coverage, and other benefits for direct care workers. “Granted, this is a longer-term strategy; it’s not going to get you a new personal care attendant tomorrow,” she writes. “On the other hand, when your current personal care attendants see you advocating for their rights, they just might think they have a pretty cool boss — and that might encourage them to want to keep their job.”
Elise Nakhnikian
Communications Director
Direct Care Alliance
