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December 04, 2007
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In This Issue:
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Leadership Stories from Maine
"I always try to communicate in positive ways. I did that before LEADS started too, but since we learned the communication tools in the coaching supervision classes I know how to take a tricky situation and turn it around," says Kim Lewis, a CNA-Med Tech at The Cedars in Portland, Maine, in Leadership Stories from Maine: the Voices of Direct Care Workers in Culture Change. The Northern New England LEADS (Leadership, Education, and Advocacy for Direct-care and Support) Institute is a regional culture change initiative aimed at building a core of strong leaders among direct-care staff, supervisors and administrators.
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Demonstration Project Explores What Motivates Direct-Care Workers
"Caregivers are Professionals, Too," a three-year, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services-funded demonstration project in North Carolina, tested the impact of three job enhancements - subsidized health insurance, professional development, and merit-based recognition - on employee satisfaction, turnover, and new employee recruitment for direct service workers. All three proved successful. The workers ranked health insurance as the most important, followed by merit bonuses, service awards, and professional development.
A report on the project outlines its methods, successes, and challenges. It also includes PowerPoint presentations, interview summaries, the survey instrument, relevant research articles, and recommendations.
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Recent additions
Click here to see what's new in the Clearinghouse.
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HCHCW Provides Advocacy Training at Direct-Care Worker Conference
Direct-care workers honed their advocacy skills at a workshop sponsored by Health Care for Health Care Workers during the Pennsylvania Direct Care Workers Association's annual conference in Harrisburg earlier this month. Legislative staff, lobbyists, and public relations and media specialists offered practical advice on how to meet with and write to legislators. Workshop participants also drafted letters to the editor.
To learn how you can advocate for health care coverage for direct-care workers, contact Health Care for Health Care Workers' Tracy Lawless at 724-933-6164 or tlawless@PHInational.org.
Health Care Reform: What Women Want
The women's perspective on health care will be presented at a Washington, D.C. forum cosponsored by Health Care for Health Care Workers. Aimed at organizations that care about low-wage women, women's access to health care, civil rights, and other issues affecting working women, Health Care Reform: What Women Want will present findings from a Herndon Alliance poll. The December 12 forum will focus on how health reform proposals and messages relate to women in their varied roles as caregivers, family decision makers, voters, etc. Click here to register.
Health Care Checklist
An eight-page policy brief from Health Care for Health Care Workers outlines how to ensure that state health reform efforts include direct-care workers - and why it's important to do so. Expanding Coverage for Caregivers: A Checklist for State Health Reform includes an easy-to-use checklist to help legislators and policymakers make sure that proposed legislation meets the needs of direct-care workers.
New Health Care Reform Group Forming Regional Coalitions in Pennsylvania
Health Care for Health Care Workers is part of a group formed this year in Pennsylvania, which brings together a diverse group of stakeholders to advocate for improved access to health care.
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More Information
Click here to read more from and about the HCHCW campaign.
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Kaiser Report Looks at Medicaid's Role in Long-Term Care
A report from the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured examines the structure and impact of Medicaid's role in long-term care, highlighting policy challenges facing the program. Based on a roundtable discussion of policymakers and experts and drawn from a body of health services research, the report raises a number of issues, including integration of services for people who use long-term care, variations in Medicaid disability criteria across beneficiary groups and states, and how to achieve a balance between institutional and community-based care.
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If you're reading this in a web browser, return to your e-mail to vote. Votes cast from the browser are not counted.
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What would do the most to reduce depression rates among direct-care workers?
Prozac: 0%
Being treated with respect given autonomy and decision-making power on the job: 63%
Earning a living wage and good benefits: 37%
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Dear Friend,
I don't know how it feels to you to read it, but compiling Quality Care/Quality Jobs makes me feel hopeful about the work being done to support and stabilize the direct-care workforce. So many of the publications and programs touched on in this issue go far beyond the usual descriptions and prescriptions. -- and that's good news for us all.
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Teasing Out the Elements of Effective Training and Education
The winter 2007-2008 issue of Gerontology & Geriatrics Education (Volume 28, Number 2) is devoted to direct-care worker training and education. The 131-page special issue consists mainly of reports on research done for the Better Jobs Better Care (BJBC) research and demonstration project.
In the introduction to the special issue, Executive Director Robyn Stone of the Institute for the Future of Aging Services (pictured above) notes: "For many years, the solution for many [direct-care] workforce problems has been 'let's require more training.' For the most part, this meant requiring more hours of training. The articles in this special issue begin to tease out the elements that are needed to develop a multi-faceted, strategic approach to education and training in long-term care."
Prominent researchers including Linda Noelker, Thomas Konrad, and Diane Brannon showcase effective educational initiatives for workers and their supervisors, discussing how they were structured, their successes and limitations, and the implications for further research and education.
Free to subscribers only; others must pay.
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Two Programs that Support CNAs Win National Recognition
Growing Strong Roots, the Foundation for Long Term Care's peer mentoring program, was the first runner-up for the 2007
Archstone Foundation Award for Excellence in
Program Innovation. FLTC received the award at the American Public Health Association's annual conference on November 5. Three days later, North Carolina's WIN A STEP UP program announced that it was one of two finalists for the 2007 Rosalynn Carter Leadership in Caregiving award. WIN A STEP UP provides training and support for both career nursing assistants and their supervisors.
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Conference Explores Link between Paid and Family Caregivers
Three reports on the link between formal and informal caregiving networks are included in the proceedings of a March 2007 national conference on family caregiving, now available free of charge online.
The proceedings cover both plenary sessions and workshop panel presentations, including sessions on the workforce by Robyn Stone of the Institute for the Future of Aging Services, Gail Hunt of the National Alliance for Caregiving, and Dorie Seavey of PHI. They conclude with a summary of all the recommendations put forth in various sessions.
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PHI's Angelelli Recommends Care in Reviewing Equity Firm's Application
Joe Angelelli, PHI's Pennsylvania State Director, testified before Pennsylvania legislators on the sale of HCR Manor Care, a large for-profit chain, to a private equity group. The Pennsylvania hearing was part of a new focus on the buying of large nursing home chains by private equity firms, which began with a New York Times feature that documented a decline in average nurse staffing levels - and care quality - under private equity ownership.
In his November 13 testimony, Angelelli noted that Manor Care nursing homes in Pennsylvania already staff below the minimum level recommended in a 2001 report to Congress. He also expressed concerns that staffing levels would decline even more under private equity ownership.
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Toolkit for Advocates of Nursing Home Staffing Standards
A free online toolkit from the Long Term Care Community Coalition can help you advocate for adequate staffing in nursing homes. Tools include sample letters to a legislator and to the editor, issue briefs on the care crisis and the cost effectiveness of safe staffing, a list of members of Congress who have demonstrated support for nursing home residents, and more.
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Work Group Recommends Strategies for Strengthening the DSP Workforce
"Serious attention must be given to enhancing the quality of the direct support workforce in order to provide quality services that align with and meet the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare (CMS) Quality Framework," says a report from the Direct Support Professional Work Group of the North Carolina Commission for Mental Health, Developmental Disabilities, and Substance Abuse.
The report summarizes researched-based interventions shown to improve direct-care worker retention and competence and reports the results of "listening sessions" conducted with what service recipients, family members, and the workers it calls direct support professionals (DSPs). It also presents the work group's recommendations for improving compensation, recruitment, retention, and training for workers and their supervisors.
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Worker Association Formed in Indiana
John Booker, the founding president of the National Association of Direct Care Workers of Color, has started a direct-care worker association for Indiana, his home state. The Indiana Care-Givers Association had its first meeting in South Bend on November 12. Booker says the group has about 50 members. Its aim is to address the concerns of workers while improving care quality for long-term care recipients.
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DCA Launches Campaign for Fair Home Health Act
The Direct Care Alliance (DCA) has launched a campaign to generate support for the Fair Home Health Care Act. The act would extend minimum wage and overtime protections under the Fair Labor Standards Act to home care workers who are currently exempt.
To join the Respect for Homecare Workers campaign, fill out and send in the DCA's pledge form.
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February 23, 2008
National Association of Workforce Boards (NAWB) Annual Forum
January 27, 2008
The 3nd Annual Private Duty Home Care Leadership Summit
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