Home Health Aide

Introduction

Home Health Aides(HHA) are healthcare professionals, who visit the homes of the ill, disabled, elderly, socially disadvantaged who are unable to perform basic tasks and so HHAs provide a wide spectrum of personal and home making assistance. The people who receive care usually need help with basic daily tasks such as meal preparation, medication reminders, laundry, light housekeeping, errands, shopping, transportation, and companionship (Wikipedia, 2007). There are several different agencies which provide home care services the elderly but all HHAs provide the same care and have the same responsibilities towards their clients. It is therefore very important for the caregiver to perform duties with the outmost quality and professional manner along with their supervisors or nurses so that clients may feel independent, happy, and safe in their homes.

I work as a HHA at Central Coast Senior Service, Inc. (CCSS). It is a private healthcare agency that provides assistance for people over 65 years of age. The office is located in Pacific Grove, California, on 207 16th Street, Suite 300. The founder and the manager of this organization is Mrs. Mary Cwikla.

My career goal is to get my Bachelor of Science in health science (administration option) and to then apply for the nursing program to become an RN. The experiences that I have acquired as an HHA will help me get a job at the hospital as a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) and thereby get me one step closer to the nursing program.

Internship Description

The CCSS agency provides 24/7 care, and one of my responsibilities is to relieve my co-worker on time to start on my 12-hr shift. My duties include helping my clients with what is called their "activities of daily livings" or (ADLs). Part of my job duties include helping clients with bathing, dressing, transforming, using the bathroom, eating, and walking. I also help out with doing the laundry, vacuuming the house, and cleaning the kitchen and bathrooms. I pay close attention to my clients' diets because most of them are on special nutritional diets. It is very important for elders to do some kind of exercise once a day (a few times a week) so therefore, I take them out for a walk or sometimes I get permission from a Physical Therapist (PT) to assist them with their special exercises. I also assist them with their medication under my supervisor's permission. One of the most important tasks for me as an HHA is to listen to my clients and try to understand them even if it takes a lot of time and patience. This allows me to get a one on one interaction with my clients and initiate a comfort zone with them. At the end of the day, I am responsible for recording and charting everything down in the chart book correctly.

Literature Review

According to Swanson (2005), the personal assistants help the clients in their daily activities including bathing, personal hygiene, prescribed exercise, help them with walking, regularly rotate patients who are bed-ridden, take their pulse, respiration, and blood pressure, and assist patients with their medications. In addition, the caregiver also provides important human contact, emotional support, and helps in allowing the client to feel that they can do much of the daily routines without any help. This allows the client to feel that they are in control of their lives and that personal caregivers are only there as a helping hand. The caregivers do some housekeeping to maintain the house and keep it clean. The duties include: changing bed linen, preparing meals, doing the laundry, doing grocery shopping, and monitor special diets that most patients have. By keeping track of patient's progress or decline, the family can figure out if they need to keep the service or take the patient to a nursing home due to their health conditions.

A study in 1999 at Washington, by Froymovich (2007) shows that supervisor's play an important role in a caregiver's career by being there when he/she needs emotional support or any other equipment/tools that caregiver needs for his or her job. Froymovich also implies that the caregivers' job is stressful and easily an overwhelmed because they also take care of their own families when they get home. Therefore, the supervisors and caregivers should work as a team because these home cares spend most of their time at their client/patient's houses and they also need emotional and professional care for their well-being (Froymovich, 2007). Moreover, it is important for the supervisors to talk with their employees and share their goals with them so they don't feel left alone at their work. It is important for caregivers to feel special by rewarding and praising them for when reward and praise is due for doing an excellent work with their company.

The Bureau of Labor Statistic (BLS), U.S. Department of Labor (2006), states that the average hourly earnings for health aides are $8.54. The lowest hourly pay is $6.05 and 10 percent of HHA earns this salary (BLS, 2008). The highest 10 percent HHA gets their hourly pay more than $11.60 per hour. However, according to BLS, there is something called "median hourly earnings", that goes from $7.09 to $10.19 per hour depending on the company and its location. Most companies give slight increase in pay but some of them provide other benefits like health insurance, travel time between jobs. Other companies do not provide any benefits, only provide the hourly pay.

Hand washing is a simple habit, something most people do without thinking. According to Antoville (2001), hand washing skills and universal precautions are the best ways to keep the resident, the family, and caregiver's safe. He mentioned that HHC's hands often come in contact with urine, feces, mucus, emesis and blood directly from residents, soiled towels, linens, dirty tissues, and bandages even the person has gloves on. Their hands also come in contact indirectly from the door knobs, bed rails, and call lights. At the same time, people unintentionally rub their noses, wipe their eyes, and touch their mouths several times a day. Hands should be washed before and after using the gloves. This way HHC will protect his/her self and keep the resident healthy at the same time by just washing hands and use hand sanitizer all the times.

Home care services are very important and Medicare and Medicaid play an essential role in the provision (Parks, 2003). Sine Medicaid and Medicare provide health insurance for elderly citizens, over age 65. They also provide expenses for home care, but the patient must meet certain requirements. However, Medicare has limits on reimbursable care at home