Home Care Daily - National Home Care Industry News

As the home care industry continues to grow and expand, and even become stronger, it has gained a great deal of attention across many media outlets. Some of the attention is positive and some not so much. While pay and benefits continue to be a pressing issue for many caregivers as well as agencies struggling to maintain consistency of care for its clients, history tells us that, over time, the general public as well as politicians and bureaucrats can become numb to certain issues.

Even though it is called An Act Strengthening Home Care Services, Connecticut legislative proposal SB 1051 could actually have the exact opposite impact on caregivers throughout the state. While the intention of the bill might be advertised as improving quality of care and support for elderly and disabled clients throughout the state, there may be a more surreptitious purpose. 

A Pennsylvania home health care worker was recently sentenced to a minimum of six months in jail for stealing from an elderly client. The victim in this case was an 87-year-old veteran who had hired Melissa Miller to take care of him in his home. When she became a live in caregiver, she moved in a number of her family members and friends, with different people coming and going, and as many as nine people living in a double wide trailer at the same time. 

During an entirely unacceptable circumstance, some patients of home health care support services had stopped receiving care without any notice as an agency allegedly no longer paid its employees. Oracle Home Health Care in Plant City, Florida is alleged to have ceased submitting paychecks to its caregivers who had already provided services. 

A home health care nurse in St. Louis was recently arrested and charged with stealing jewelry from a patient’s home. Rachel Capone, 33, had been hired to look after an elderly person, providing various services, including direct medical attention at times, but is said to have taken a grocery bag that was filled with jewelry from the victim’s kitchen cabinet. 

A bill that’s being considered in the New Jersey legislature could have a direct impact on many services that connect individuals in need with home care and other service providers. Currently, referral services for home care and other types of support are not required to register as a health care service firm.  In other words, these organizations, many…

For those who work directly within the home care industry, news stories that focus on crimes committed by home care aides and other providers can often feel like nails being dragged across a blackboard. It is the tendency of media outlets to focus on tragedy and crime, even though these unfortunate aspects that occur within this industry are the vast exception rather than the rule. 

It’s expected that New Jersey will soon become the seventh state (plus DC) to have a law enabling terminally ill people to seek out medical assistance to end their lives. New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has stated he expects to sign the bill into law soon. It is called The Medical Aid in Dying for the Terminally Ill Act.