 |
|
|
January 04, 2008
|
In This Issue:
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
Study Identifies Keys to Satisfaction for Dementia Care Workers
To promote a higher level of life satisfaction among personal care workers (PCWs) in dementia care, employers should tailor training and continuing education to address their needs, according to Factors Associated with Life Satisfaction of Personal Care Workers Delivering Dementia Care in Day Care Centers. "A harmonious working environment that encourages interpersonal support and acknowledges staff's contribution should also help promote a strong sense of self-efficacy among PCWs," adds the report.
The Hong Kong study found that the workers were in general "quite satisfied" with their lives, though poor physical health was predictive of low satisfaction levels. Workers who think of themselves as effective in dementia care were more likely to be satisfied, as were those who were highly satisfied with training, had a low staff-to-client ratio, or had a high level of emotional social support from colleagues
The article, which was published in Social Work in Health Care, Volume 46 Issue 1, is free to subscribers only. Others must pay $25.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
New Publications Describe Successful State Strategies for Expanding Coverage
"Proven strategies exist for making employer-based health insurance more affordable and accessible for direct-care workers and their employers," says a new publication from Health Care for Health Care Workers.
Coverage Models from the States: Strategies for expanding health care coverage to the direct-care workforce outlines five basic strategies: making employer-based insurance more affordable, expanding public insurance coverage, establishing coverage through collective bargaining, building insurance costs into Medicaid reimbursement, and assisting workers with health care expenses. It describes the approaches of three states that use one or more of those strategies, summing up their track records and listing key features, advantages, and disadvantages. The 48-page brief also provides contact information and links to publications or websites that can provide more detail.
Another recent Health Care for Health Care Workers publication, the eight-page Expanding Coverage for Caregivers: A Checklist for State Health Reform, provides policymakers with an easy-to-use tool for assessing whether health care reform plans would be accessible, affordable, and adequate for the direct-care workers.
|
|
 |
|
ICA Seizes Opportunity to Educate Presidential Candidates
The Iowa CareGivers Association (ICA), the leader of Iowa's Health Care for Health Care Workers campaign, used a comment made in passing about nursing home workers on a recent episode of Larry King Live as a "teachable moment" last week.
After Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee referred to nursing assistant work as "emptying a bedpan" in a discussion of criminal background checks, the ICA sent Governor Huckabee and others a letter objecting to that characterization.
The rest of the story
|
|
|
|
How to Tailor Health Care Reform Messages to Women
Health care reform leaders gathered in Washington, DC, last month to learn what women voters want when it comes to health care in the United States. The briefing was sponsored by the PHI Healthcare for Healthcare Workers Campaign and the National Women's Law Center.
Celinda Lake, president of Lake Research, focused on the findings about women's attitudes and preferences in a survey conducted by her organization for the Herndon Alliance on voters' values and perspectives on health care reform. Rising costs and quality are the top concerns for women when it comes to health care, she said, and women see health care as a core value in our society. She also pointed out that learning to tailor messages on health care to women is particularly important because women make most of the decisions within families about health issues.
Lake presented another set of findings from the survey at a Michigan briefing the following week.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
If you're reading this in a web browser, return to your e-mail to vote. Votes cast from the browser are not counted.
|
|
 |
|
|
More direct-care workers work in home- and community-based settings than in nursing homes and other institutions
The correct answer (which 81% of you got right): True
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Dear Friend,
If you're working on improving health care coverage for direct-care workers - or you just want evidence that it can be done - you might want to click on the links in New from HCHCW this week. Two new publications from the Health Care for Health Care Workers campaign and a power point presentation from researcher Celinda Lake all include practical information, analysis, and valuable lessons learned.
|
|
|
|
 |
VNS Initiative Improves Work Life for Home Care Aides, ADLs for Patients
A successful effort to improve quality of life for home care workers and the people they assist is described in HHA Partnering Collaborative Evaluation: Practice/Research Brief, a publication of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Office of Assistant Secretary for Policy & Evaluation.
The initiative was launched in 2003 by the Visiting Nurse Service of New York. Its goal is to improve the work life of home care aides and increase support for their patients' improvement in key activities of daily living. Components include:
- Implementation of the "Five Promises" -- a set of field supervision practices designed to promote positive and effective communication among all caregivers while in the patient's home.
- Use of an ADL Tool to structure common goal-setting among nurses, patients, and aides in order to improve functional health.
- Proactive communication between patient service managers and licensed agency coordinators to cover aide supervision and service delivery issues.
- Increase in field support and supervision provided to aides.
In addition, it has changed the culture of health service delivery by moving from a purely professional model toward one of self-care management. In the self-care management model, patients and informal caregivers are active participants in decision-making and goal-setting, and home health aides play a key supportive role.
|
 |
|
Immigrants Flock to Direct-Care Work in New York City
More immigrants in New York City - 108,600, to be exact - work as nursing, psychiatric, and home health aides than in any other occupation, according to Working for a Better Life: A Profile of Immigrants in the New York State Economy. Immigrants also make up two-thirds of the city's personal and home care aides, totaling 22,000 workers.
The report, from New York's Fiscal Policy Institute, notes that immigrants make up 21 percent of the state's population and contribute broadly to its economy, integrating into their communities in many ways.
|
|
|
LTC Demand Outstrips Direct-Worker Supply in South Dakota
The Abt Associates report on South Dakota's long-term care system that was mentioned in the December 14 issue of this newsletter is now available online. Evaluation of Long-Term Care Options For South Dakota found that the state's demand for long-term care services is outpacing the supply of workers, thanks to a booming population of elders and a wave of migration from small towns to cities. CNA turnover rates for the state are over 40 percent a year, and 4 percent of the jobs budgeted for CNAs were unfilled at the time of the survey.
|
|
|
Newspaper Opinion Pieces Advocate for Direct-Care Workers
Three recent newspaper pieces call for better respect, wages, and benefits for direct-care workers.
A Baltimore Sun editorial starts with the timely thought: "Here's a New Year's wish: Pay the people who care for our loved ones at home a decent wage." Writer Tram Nguyen advocates supporting the proposed law that would overturn the Supreme Court's Coke ruling. "We must support a floor of better wages, benefits and respect for home care workers," she declares.
In an article in the Sun Journal of west-central Maine, the author of Dancing with Rose calls for advocating for increased staffing in elder-care facilities. In "Welcome to 'Maplewood,'" Lauren Kessler writes that she and her fellow baby boomers will not want to live in facilities like the one she wrote about, whose identity she disguised by calling it "Maplewood," unless things are drastically improved. And, she says, "the most important ... reason you or I wouldn't want to live at Maplewood - or thousands of other elder-care facilities in America - is that the place is seriously understaffed and the staff seriously overworked."
And a letter to the editor of the Daily Mining Gazette in Michigan's Upper Peninsula thanks the nursing assistants who cared for in the hospital where the writer had a knee replacement, naming each and listing many of the "kindnesses" they performed for her. "I think often the doctors and nurses are thanked and praised," she says. "But the nurse aides, the ones who really do the hands-on care, are forgotten."
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
January 27, 2008
The 3nd Annual Private Duty Home Care Leadership Summit
February 23, 2008
National Association of Workforce Boards (NAWB) Annual Forum
|
 |
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
