It can be a challenging and overwhelming undertaking when arranging home care for your loved ones. Firstly, you must find a reputable home-care agency offering services that meet your requirements and budget, with a professionally trained and compassionate caregiver.
Secondly, you'll need to identify the signs when it's time to switch providers altogether, when you require a better fit and an improved home support experience.
Nurse Next Door has been committed to Making Lives Better® since 2001 by providing personalized home-care services for their clients and their families. The team understands that all families want the same things when looking for home care for their loved ones: someone who is competent, kind, trustworthy and capable of helping; someone who understands that every family is unique and has unique needs.
Typically, you should look for three criteria in a potential caregiver:
- Compatibility (a good fit; someone your loved one accepts)
- Reliability (dependable attentive care, on-time, rare or zero no-shows)
- Consistency (the same small team of care staff that you get to know and trust will come every week). Routine is very important for everyone’s peace of mind
Over time you may realize the seniors’ care you've secured is no longer meeting your expectations or fulfilling your elderly parents' health-care needs.
Changing care providers
"It's time to consider making a change when it’s not working well, and before it becomes urgent," says Carol Lange of Nurse Next Door Homecare. "Family caregiver burnout is a huge issue, and taking a pause to consider what's working and what's not can lead to a much less stressful experience."
"Making changes urgently is also very hard on seniors and other clients. The key is to give them enough time, for example, a few weeks, to make the change and to process the changes."
Here are four tips on when you should consider changing your home-care provider:
- Your caregivers are not reliable, consistent, or a good match
- Your care provider no longer meets your loved one's needs
- Your care provider is adding more stress than they remove
- Your loved one has outgrown their provider; for instance, more hours of care are required and filling shifts with a small team of consistent caregivers proves difficult
Lange adds, "If you have relied on Fraser Health home care and need more care hours than the public system provides, or you require additional services, like meal making, light housekeeping, transportation and accompaniment, or companionship, a home-care agency can assist with these activities."
"Additionally, if a higher skill level is needed for Dementia, Alzheimer's or Parkinson’s care by a qualified health-care assistant, it's important to find a home-care company with these services."
It's essential to identify the differences in home-care providers and what sets superior agencies apart. Look for those who provide these benefits for family-funded care:
- Customized care plan and schedule
- A great match with a consistent, ongoing care team
- Bonded care staff, insured for liability and covered by WorkSafeBC
- Fully vetted care staff for criminal record, with vulnerable sector check
- Ongoing training and upskilling for the care team
- Strong interview and reference check process
- Live phone support, 24/7
- Automatic attendance monitoring and immediate follow-up if a caregiver is late
"Ultimately, the goal of having home care is to reduce the amount of stress on your family by providing the services you need, when you need them," says Lange. "Switching to a professional well-managed agency with a small, consistent team of caregivers that you'll get to know and trust, can make a huge difference."
For more information on home care services, visit nursenextdoor.com.
