The following is a guest post from Rebecca Livesay, Program Associate – Communications and Outreach for NCCNHR: The National Consumer Voice for Quality Long-Term Care.
NCCNHR, the Pioneer Network, ombudsmen programs, citizen advocacy groups, and others around the country are working to spread culture change principles and practices in our nation’s nursing homes. These principles are aimed at improving quality of life and care for residents by making nursing homes into true homes, not the medical-model institutions they too often are, with inflexible management hierarchies that put residents on the bottom of the pyramid.
To accomplish that goal, we must create a new role for direct care workers, valuing their work and relationships with residents and giving them more autonomy and decision-making power so they can deliver the individualized, “person-centered” care residents want and need. The traditional task-focused, almost assembly-line role assigned to nursing assistants in nursing homes actually gets in the way of delivering good care, forcing workers to do things like wake people up way to early to prepare them for meals or bathe them when they don’t want to be bathed. Continue reading »
We’re starting to coagulate as a direct care worker movement, and it’s more important than ever that we unite to get things done. This is an exciting time, but it calls for more strategic thinking.
Over the past year or two, I’ve been in many situations when direct care workers were connecting with each other. This can be incredibly inspiring. Many of us are compassionate people who are drawn to this kind of service work because we want to put our hearts into nurturing and supporting others. At direct care worker gatherings, I have watched us uplift, encourage and comfort one another, creating a spirit of loyalty and kindness and mutual respect. This is when we’re at our finest. But like anything, there are two sides. There are times when we’re at our best, and times when we’re at our worst. And because we’re at such a critical point in time, I wanted to offer some reflection and advice on focusing on our best selves. Continue reading »
We direct care workers are a very important and powerful group of individuals. At times, we actually hold the very power of life and death in our hands. Especially if we are CPR-certified or have some advanced training, we can perform interventions that make a profound, life-sustaining difference in a matter of moments.
And those skills, I’ve learned, apply to our own lives as well as our work.
When I was challenged, many years ago, with assisting my mother in her last days, I had no CNA training or experience. I had no idea how to help my mother or make her comfortable and myself safe, so we both suffered.
As a result of that experience, I became a professional direct care worker. I soon acquired a new set of skills, like how to take someone’s blood pressure and recognize its danger signs, how to measure a pulse or respiration rate and know what to make of the results, and how to position a bed-bound person. I also learned about things like the need for special diets and the importance of proper hydration – all important skills and knowledge for helping to maintain a person’s life.
A few years ago, I was called on that training for a purpose I had never anticipated: Caring for my wife during what became a long battle with cancer. In caring for her, I found that my direct care worker training and experience made me a much better caregiver, but it also brought me face to face with a terrible choice. Continue reading »
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.
In this video, shot by and starring graduates of the 2009 Voices Institute National Leadership Program, direct care worker advocates speak out about why they love their work and what needs to change.
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
I’m a third-year medical student at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. Last summer, I spent two weeks in a nursing home in Maine as part of the Learning by Living Project, where medical students are admitted to nursing homes as residents to gain insight into how it feels to be an elder in a nursing home. The observations that follow are taken from the journal I kept while I was there.
It is really amazing how much the CNAs know about the people they take care of. They are what make the medical system tick. They bring up names and stories and what the residents did that endeared them to the CNAs. They know what each resident’s preferences are. Those they really love become family, and when the resident dies, they shed tears. That is the kind of relationship that I hope I will have one day with my patients.
Yes, sometimes they are spit upon, peed upon, hated upon, but other times they are loved, appreciated, and always needed. They all have favorites. Some even have favorite floors – for many, the dementia floor, it seems. Continue reading »
Daniel Escojido, a 26-year-old direct support professional who is the house manager for a group home is Ponca City, Oklahoma, is profiled in the October issue of The DSP Chronicles. “Is he mature beyond his 26 years? For sure!” says his supervisor in Tom King’s article. “Some people in this field have got it, and some don’t have it. Daniel’s got it.”
He was inspired to join the field by his mother, Maria, who provided in-home supports for the elderly. “I saw and watched and heard how she talked with them, the difference she made in their lives and how she loved them and they loved her and I’ve never forgotten that,” he told the publication.
Boston Globe Honors Evelyn Coke, Calls for “Decent Pay” for Home Care Workers
My mother-in-law’s death this summer was a blow to my whole family. Nothing can really prepare you for the loss of somebody you love. But helping her through her last months made me realize how much my work as a CNA has taught me about death.
I never thought much about death before I became a direct care worker. When I was forced to face it, in those days, I turned away as fast as possible. If someone close to me had died, I would avoid going up to the casket at the funeral home. Sure, I cried and mourned the death, but I distanced myself from it.
I also distanced myself from people who were close to death. When I became a direct care worker, 13 years ago, I would trade residents with other workers to avoid anyone who seemed close to the end. Sometimes I would even take on two residents in exchange for one who was dying.
I’m not sure when things started to change. Maybe it was the first time I helped wash a dead person. The nurse asked me to get her ready to be picked up by the funeral home, so I went into the room, scared and unsure where to start. I got so worried I started to cry. (CNA training does not prepare you to deal with the dead.) Continue reading »
Victoria Johnson during her stay in the nursing home
It was the last week of this May and just starting to warm up when I checked myself into the Highlands Nursing Home in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. I am a 29-year-old medical student at the University Of New England College Of Osteopathic Medicine, and I was taking part in the Learning by Living Project, where medical students are admitted to nursing homes as residents for two weeks to gain insight into how it feels to be an elder in a nursing home.
My day-to-day care and well-being rested solely in the hands of my certified nursing assistants (CNAs). They would wake me in the morning, clean me, dress me, and make sure I ate. I would turn to them if I needed to use the bathroom, wasn’t feeling well, or wanted to go back to my room.
Right off the bat it was easy to see that these CNAs were not caring for the elderly for fame and glory, but because they wanted to help. They wanted their work to make a difference, and that’s what drove them to do their jobs well.
During my stay I saw many families thanking the staff, but it saddened me to know that they hadn’t had the opportunity to meet all of the amazing people taking care of their family members. Continue reading »
