Archive for ‘turnover’

Texas to Hire More Direct Care Workers for Troubled State Schools

Posted by on June 16th, 2009 at 4:17 pm | 1 Comment »
Renee Tillman

Renee Tillman

There’s trouble in Texas’s so-called state schools, live-in institutions that provide campus-based long-term care for people with mental disabilities.

State investigators uncovered more than 500 cases of abuse and neglect in the schools between September 2007 and August 2008, and a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) investigation found systemic abuses of the civil rights of the school’s roughly 4,700 residents. The DOJ’s report said many of the problems are due to high turnover rates, staff vacancies, and inadequate staff training and supervision. Late last month, the state reached an agreement with the DOJ intended to improve conditions in the schools. Among other things, the schools will get 1,160 more staff, most of them direct-care workers.

Here’s what CNA/CHPNA Renee Tillman, the founding president of the Texas Association of Nurse Assistants, has to say about this unfortunate situation and the proposed solution.

Hiring more workers should help. Direct care workers employed in mental health also need better initial and ongoing training. We have to have yearly in-services on Alzheimer’s and dementia care, but the kinds of mental health issues these kids have are completely different

I think Governor Perry feels he needs medical professionals monitoring the care in these schools. Two very close friends of mine were working in one of the schools that was shut down, and from what I’ve heard, some of the people who worked there were acting more like guards than caregivers or teachers, treating the kids almost like felons. They were also trying to impose discipline without much training, and there wasn’t much of a monitoring system in place to oversee what they were doing.

The kids who are in these institutions often come from pretty tough circumstances. If we’re not careful, they can easily be neglected inside the schools. We need to make sure the people who work there get the training they need. There should also be a special committee to oversee the program, to prevent the physical and sexual abuse that has been happening to these kids.

Legal Expert Calls for Minimum Labor Protections for Home Care Workers

Posted by on June 8th, 2009 at 6:57 pm | 4 Comments »
Peggie Smith

Peggie Smith

“Federal reform is urgently needed to provide home care workers with the compensation and respect they deserve,” says Peggie Smith.

Smith, who is the Murray Family Professor of Law at the University of Iowa College of Law and a graduate of Harvard Law, is talking about a U.S. Supreme Court decision that excluded home care workers from protection under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). The court said the workers were providing companionship services.

In Protecting Home Care Workers under the Fair Labor Standards Act, (PDF) the second in a series of Direct Care Alliance policy briefs, Smith says the decision “threatens to destabilize the home care industry, erode the precarious economic status of home care workers, and undermine the quality of care that they provide to home care clients.”

She outlines two approaches the federal government could take to reverse the ruling:
1. Amend the FLSA to explicitly include home care workers; and
2. Revise Department of Labor (DOL) regulations to significantly limit the reach of the companionship exemption.

Smith recommends that the government do both, with the DOL taking immediate action to revise the companionship exemption while Congress works to reverse the impact of the Supreme Court decision by passing the Fair Home Health Care Act. Continue reading »

Gerontologist Reports on CNA Characteristics and What Causes Turnover

Posted by on May 27th, 2009 at 6:01 pm | No Comments »

the-gerontologist-april-2009-coverThe April issue of The Gerontologist reports on several important studies about direct care workers, starting with the long-anticipated National Nursing Assistant Survey (NNAS).

A paper about the survey, which is based on data from 2004, says it represents “a major advance in the data available about CNAs in nursing homes.” The report lists some of the survey’s major findings and suggests that the data be used for “evidence-based policy, practice, and applied research initiatives to address the CNA workforce shortage and to improve recruitment and retention efforts.”

Among the findings of the NNAS:
• Almost half of all CNAs are members of a minority group;
• Their median hourly wage was $10.04, and almost two-thirds lived on an annual family income of less than $30,000; and
• More than 40% did not participate in their employer’s health insurance plan because they couldn’t afford the premiums.

The April Gerontologist also looks at the causes of high CNA turnover rates from two different angles.  

Continue reading »

HHS Secretary Sebelius: “It is Our Goal to Improve the Attractiveness of Caregiving Jobs”

Posted by on May 27th, 2009 at 2:40 pm | No Comments »
Kathleen Sebelius

Kathleen Sebelius

The new head of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) expresses her appreciation for direct care workers and pledges her determination to improve their jobs in a May 18 letter to the Washington Post.

In her letter, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius calls direct care workers “the backbone of our long-term care system,” adding: “Their compassion and work is invaluable to individuals, their families and our society.”

“The Department of Health and Human Services is deeply concerned about the needs of long-term care workers and maintaining an adequate and high-quality workforce,” Sebelius writes. “It is our goal to improve the attractiveness of caregiving jobs and reduce worker turnover. Ultimately, this will result in improvements in the quality of life and care of disabled and older Americans.”

The letter was published in response to “Marilyn Daniel’s Reward,” the May 10 cover story of the Washington Post magazine.

Elise Nakhnikian
Communications Director
Direct Care Alliance

DCA Asks Senate Finance Committee to Support Direct Care Worker Health Care Reform Priorities

Posted by on May 27th, 2009 at 1:49 pm | No Comments »
Leonila Vega

Leonila Vega

The Direct Care Alliance is working hard to ensure that the voices of workers and their allies are heard in the debate on health care reform.

As you already know if you’ve been reading our newsletter or blog, we went to Washington last month to talk to legislators and key committee staff. We asked them to make sure their health care reform bill includes health care coverage for all direct care workers. We also told them that we can’t have true health care reform without labor protections, training, career advancement opportunities and other job improvements for direct care workers.

We’ve also sent letters to President Obama (PDF) and U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, (PDF)  asking them to support direct care workers and improve direct care jobs.

Our latest letter (PDF) went out to the Senate Finance Committee on May 15. It was a response to a call for comments from the committee, which wants input on the health care reform legislation it is working on. The committee wanted input on two documents describing policy options: Expanding Health Care Coverage: Proposals to Provide Affordable Coverage to All Americans (PDF) and Transforming the Health Care Delivery System: Proposals to Improve Patient Care and Reduce Health Care Costs (PDF).

Continue reading »

Lieutenant Governor Thanks Oklahoma Personal Care Attendants

Posted by on May 22nd, 2009 at 5:06 pm | 2 Comments »
From left: Tana Parrott, Program Supervisor, OKDHS; Lance Robertson, Aging Service Division Director, OKDHS; Michelle Volpe, PCA of the year; and me.

From left: Tana Parrott, Program Supervisor, OKDHS; Lance Robertson, Aging Service Division Director, OKDHS; Michelle Volpe, PCA of the year; and me.

The lieutenant governor of Oklahoma spoke about the importance of personal care attendants, PCAs told their stories on tape for an upcoming video documentary, and Michelle Volpe, Oklahoma’s Personal Care Assistant of the Year, was honored for her dedication, charity work, and heroism. It all happened on April 30 at Oklahoma’s second annual personal care conference.

This is the second year our state has sponsored the event, which was held in Norman. It’s a joint effort between the Oklahoma Department of Human Services (OKDHS) and Medicaid home care agencies, intended to honor the best of Oklahoma’s caregivers.

I’ve led the team that creates the event both years. We see the conference as an opportunity to show our appreciation for the PCAs’ hard work. We also hope it helps remind home care agencies how important their PCAs are in delivering high-quality care.

Personal Care Assistant of the Year

Michelle Volpe was honored in part for what she did when she found a bedridden client in a locked bedroom having set her mattress on fire with a cigarette: With no time to call the fire department, she knocked down the door and carried the woman to safety.

Continue reading »

Washington Post Cover Story Asks Why Home Care Workers Stay

Posted by on May 11th, 2009 at 11:56 pm | 3 Comments »
Marilyn Daniel (R) helps Classie Morant prepare for her sister's funeral. Ms. Daniel had helped Ms. Morant care for her sister.

Marilyn Daniel (R) helps Classie Morant prepare for her sister's funeral. Ms. Daniel had helped Ms. Morant care for her sister.

“Marilyn Daniel’s Reward,” the cover story of Sunday’s Washington Post Magazine, gives readers an up close and personal view of one compassionate home health aide and her work.

Author Paula Span makes clear the skills and sensitivity that make Marilyn Daniel good at her work, as well as the many services she provides. Span also  interviews some of Daniel’s clients, her employer, and a variety of experts and advocates to answer the central question posed in the story’s subhed: “She works long hours for low wages as a home health aide — a job so demanding and underappreciated that others leave in droves. So why hasn’t she?”

DCA Executive Director Leonila Vega amplifies that question with her quote: “You can be a home care worker for 20 or 30 years and never receive a meaningful wage increase, never get a promotion. You could become an expert in working with people with physical disabilities or Alzheimer’s; yet you never receive any recognition for your increased learning and experience.”

Span, who has a book on the subject coming out next month, notes that “finding reliable, compassionate caregivers to help keep seniors in their homes isn’t easy, even in these miserable economic times,” in part because of poor pay and benefits. But her detailed and insightful portrait also makes it clear why caring people like Daniel find home care work so rewarding.

To voice your support for home care workers like Marilyn Daniel, take a moment to visit the DCA’s Legislative Action Center and ask U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis to include them in the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Elise Nakhnikian
Communications Director
Direct Care Alliance

Putting the DC in the DCA: Advocating for the FLSA Fix and Our Health Care Reform Principles

Posted by on May 4th, 2009 at 8:31 pm | 8 Comments »
Students and instructors of the first Voices Institute National Training were among the advocates at the DCA legislative visits.

Students and instructors of the first Voices Institute National Training were among the advocates at the DCA legislative visits.

The co-chairs of the Congressional Labor and Working Families Caucus have endorsed the Direct  Care Alliance’s position that home care workers are entitled to minimum wage and overtime protection.

The DCA is spearheading an effort by Linda Sánchez, Michael Michaud and Stephen Lynch, who are urging their colleagues in Congress to sign onto a letter asking U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis to end the exclusion of home care workers from the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).

Teams of Direct Care Alliance constituents from around the nation — half of them direct care workers and the rest elders, people with disabilities, employers, and other advocates — visited Capitol Hill last week, asking Members of Congress to sign the  Dear Colleague letter. The DCA teams also asked legislators and key committee staff members to support the Direct Care Alliance’s Health Care Reform Principles, which call for improvements to direct care jobs.
“We will not achieve health care reform until America’s elders and people with disabilities are sure of receiving the direct care services they need when they need them, delivered by a qualified worker,” the principles state. “And that will happen only when direct care workers receive family-sustaining wages, adequated training, health insurance, and other elements of a good job, making direct care a viable career option.” Continue reading »

Indiana Direct Care Workers Find Conference Theme: Our Brothers’ Keepers

Posted by on May 1st, 2009 at 10:41 am | 1 Comment »
John Booker

John Booker

Why do we direct care workers care about staffing and the future of our workforce?

There are so many issues involved in developing a qualified and professional long term care workforce that the fundamentals of why we are needed can sometimes get lost. So as we at the National Association for Direct Care Workers of Color and our sister organization, the Indiana Care Givers Association, began to think about a theme for our 2009 conference, we decided to go back to the basics.

We wanted to remind ourselves and others why there must be a stronger effort to recruit and retain direct care workers, even if means adjusting state and federal regulations or reimbursement rates.

Continue reading »

Direct Care Workers to Congress: We Can’t Reform Health Care until We Reform Direct Care Jobs

Posted by on April 24th, 2009 at 3:26 pm | No Comments »

capitol-hillNext week, direct care worker, consumer, and employer constituents of the Direct Care Alliance will join DCA board members on Capitol Hill to visit Members of Congress. They will advocate for three DCA health care reform principles and an immediate fix to the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), which excludes home care aides from minimum wage and overtime protection.

“Today, direct care workers begin to end decades of invisibility,” says DCA Executive Director Leonila Vega. “Workers and their allies from Texas to Pennsylvania are visiting their elected representatives to deliver the DCA message: We cannot reform health care until we reform direct care jobs.”

Related documents:
Press release (PDF)

DCA health care reform principles (PDF)

DCA letter to U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, (PDF) asking her to overturn the FLSA exemption

Elise Nakhnikian
Communications Director
Direct Care Alliance

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