Posted by Aaron Pickering on August 30th, 2010 at 10:17 am | No Comments »
The following is a guest post from Nancy Hooyman, Co-Principal Investigator for the Council on Social Work Education’s Center for Gerontological Social Work Education and Dean Emeritus and Hooyman Endowed Professor in Gerontology, University of Washington School of Social Work.
Nancy Hooyman
The vitally necessary Direct Care Workforce Empowerment Act is deserving of the support from a wide range of stakeholders – social workers, other eldercare providers, those committed to social justice as well as those focused on the economics of long-term care. Direct care staff are second only to families as the primary providers of long-term care — the “hands, voice, face” and core of the long-term care system. The care they provide is “high-touch” intimate, personal, and physically/emotionally challenging (Harahan and Stone, 2009; Institute of Medicine, 2008). These hands-on providers are expected to be compassionate yet usually do not feel prepared, respected, or appreciated, in part because our society does not value the socially and economically important work of caregiving.
Supporting this Act is also a matter of social justice and congruent with social work’s commitment to improve the lives of historically disadvantaged groups. The intersections of gender, race, and immigration status are reflected in the low status and negative work conditions of direct care workers. Advocates for women’s equity should also support this Act; nine out of ten of direct care staff are women, oftentimes single mothers, with minimal education, frequently holding more than one job but still living in poverty or near-poverty, and increasingly dependent on food stamps and other public benefits to get by. The Act is also an issue of racial justice Continue reading »
Posted by Tracy Dudzinski on June 28th, 2010 at 11:54 am | 1 Comment »
Tracy Dudzinski
On June 15, 2010, I was fortunate to be able to travel to Capitol Hill again. I was part of a delegation from Wisconsin who visited with Senator Herb Kohl’s office. There were six of us (see photo below), including myself, Susan Rosa (a family caregiver), Tracy Schroepfer (a geriatric social worker), Sharon Roth Maguire (a geriatric nurse practitioner), and Dr. Paul Drinka and Dr. Michael Malone (geriatricians). We were brought together by the Eldercare Workforce Alliance (EWA), founded by Leonila Vega of the Direct Care Alliance and others.
During the visit with Senator Kohl, I explained the importance of the direct care worker training program that was established as part of health care reform and asked that he fight to get money appropriated. I also advocated for training programs for workers. As a supportive home care agency, we have a hard time finding qualified workers. We actually hired a certified nursing assistant who had never given a bath – which we didn’t know before hiring her. We need better training because the specialized needs of consumers are increasing as people live longer.
Senator Kohl seemed surprised to learn that dog groomers and hair stylists have more training than direct care workers. I think that is unacceptable when we are dealing with people’s lives. Continue reading »
Posted by Vera Salter on May 14th, 2010 at 1:31 pm | 1 Comment »
Vera Salter
Pilot testing of the new personal caregiver credential is going strong at testing sites across the country that have stepped up to participate in this exciting process.
The pilot phase kicked off on March 5, in Portland, Maine. Since then, tests have been administered in Arizona, California, Florida, Pennsylvania, Maine, Michigan, and Pennsylvania by private duty home care agencies, centers for independent living and direct care workers associations. Workers who complete the pilot test will be among the first to receive the credential, which meets criteria outlined by the Institute for Credentialing Excellence and will be rolled out nationwide later this year. Two tests were administered by Jason Toro of the Training Academy for Personal Caregivers and Assistants in San Francisco. “Participants were excited and thankful to take the test and observed that the test questions are about real situations that are happening in the workplace,” Jason said. Continue reading »
Posted by Vera Salter on March 18th, 2010 at 1:30 pm | 4 Comments »
Vera Salter
I’m thrilled to announce the Direct Care Alliance’s new national credentialing program. Thanks to a generous grant from the Ford Foundation and the support of employers, direct care workers and consumers across the country, this credential is expected to become the gold standard credential for personal care workers.
The Direct Care Alliance launched the pilot phase of the credentialing program on March 5, in Portland, Maine. Additional pilot tests have been administered in Tucson, Arizona, and by the Pennsylvania Direct Care Workers Association. Workers who complete the pilot test will be among the first to receive the credential, which meets criteria outlined by the Institute for Credentialing Excellence and will be rolled out nationwide later this year. Read the complete announcement and the fact sheet.
Posted by Aaron Pickering on March 12th, 2010 at 12:50 pm | 6 Comments »
This is a guest post from Voices Institute graduate Angel Saylor.
Angel Saylor (right)
Over 200 Certified Nursing Assistants and their allies came together in Charlottesville, Virginia, on February 16 to share ideas on improving the workplace. The conference was hosted by the Community Partnership for Improved Long-term Care, an initiative of the Legal Aid Justice Center. It brought together direct care workers, elders, advocates, employers, doctors, nurses and others to:
• Exchange information and best practices;
• Recognize the challenges and celebrate the accomplishments of long-term care workers and caregivers from all settings;
• Learn how to enhance professionalism, leadership and teamwork, and offer solutions to reduce turnover; and
• Participate in skills training for caregivers to better meet the needs of disabled persons and seniors living with the challenges of aging. Continue reading »
Posted by Becka Livesay on March 10th, 2010 at 3:12 pm | 4 Comments »
Becka Livesay
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 »
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 Elise Nakhnikian on February 15th, 2010 at 12:45 am | No Comments »
A scholarship for caregivers will be awarded this spring to a professional caregiver for seniors or adults with disabilities in Vermont. The first annual Linda Andersen Caregiver Scholarship, named in honor of a long-time caregiver who passed away suddenly last year, is being presented by Armistead Caregiver Services in conjunction with the Community of Vermont Elders (COVE).
“We want to honor Linda’s dedication to seniors, her teammates and Armistead with this $1,000 scholarship. We also want to honor caregiving as a career by making access to education and training a little easier,” says Rachel Lee Cummings, President of Armistead. COVE will administer the scholarship, collecting and reviewing applications and making the award decision.
Applicants must have at least two years of caregiving experience, be at least 18 years old, and be a legal resident of Vermont. The winner must apply the money toward education or training related to the caregiver field, such as conflict management, gerontology, psychology, nursing, or medical school.
The scholarship will be awarded in April.
Read more and download the application (PDF)
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 Bob Stevens on February 10th, 2010 at 6:26 pm | 7 Comments »
Bob Stevens
In my seven years as a direct care worker, my profession has brought fulfillment and satisfaction to my life.
These are my rewards:
- Purpose. Helping people in need is a great reason for getting out of bed each day.
- Opportunity. Being in a position to make a difference by working and advocating for improved care is a privilege.
- Gratitude. I am showered with thanks and appreciation from the people I support, their families and friends, and my employer.
- Respect. I get treated with utmost esteem and courtesy for what I do by the people I support, their family and friends, my employer, my co-workers, healthcare professionals, my community and my family and friends. No office politics here!
- Knowledge. I constantly learn new things from the people I support and their environment.
- Training. My employers always make training opportunities available; some required, some not. I take advantage of every offering possible, as well as self-instruction online.
- Job Security. Since direct care work is among the fastest growing occupations and since there is such a shortage of workers, good direct care workers enjoy job security.
- Flexibility. I can work as many or as few hours as I want, when I want.
- Fair Wages. I receive fair compensation, consistent with that received by other direct care workers and health care industry professionals.
How could I reasonably ask for more?
See my next blog post for the answer – or tell me what you think by commenting below.
Bob Stevens
Direct Support Professional/Senior Caregiver
Graduate, 2009 Voices Institute National Leadership Program
