Mental Health

Your Area Agency also has information on home care agencies and volunteer groups that provide transportation, chore, respite, yard work and home repair services. In addition to your Area Agency on Aging, good sources for referrals to individual home care workers and home care agencies include the Hospital or Nursing Home Discharge Planner or Social Worker, if your older relative has been hospitalized.
If you decide to hire a home care worker, you will need to determine how much help your older relative needs. You also need to decide what type of home care worker your relative needs. Following are descriptions of the types of home care personnel available:
A Homemaker or Personal Care Worker is supervised by an agency or you and provides personal care, meal planning and household management and medication reminders.
Nonprofit and for profit home care agencies recruit, train, and pay the worker. Social Service agencies, in addition to home care services, may provide an assessment of the client's needs by a nurse or social worker, and help with the adjustment or coordination of the care plan.
Home Mental Health Care Agencies focus on the medical aspects of care and provide trained health care personnel, such as nurses and physical therapists.
Who supervises the worker?
Unless your older relative needs care for a limited number of hours each day, the rates charged by private home care agencies for homemaker home mental health aide services and van services for transportation are often beyond the means of middle income families. If an older person is discharged from a hospital and receives skilled health care services at home, such as nursing or physical therapy, they are usually eligible for homemaker-home health aide services from home care agencies paid for under Medicare. When hiring the worker yourself, be sure that the home care worker has the necessary qualifications and/or training. If your older relative needs a considerable amount of help or round the clock care, consider hiring live-in help. If the home care worker is going to drive the family car, be sure to check with your insurance company concerning any limitations on your policy.
Your interview with the prospective home care worker should include a full discussion of the client's needs and limitations; as well as the home care worker's experience in caregiving and her expectations. If the home care worker has a car, discuss use of the worker's car on the job, insurance coverage for the worker's car or other travel arrangements.
If you work and are heavily dependent on the home care worker, emphasize the importance of being informed as soon as possible so that you can make alternative arrangements, if the home care worker is going to be late or absent. You should have a list of home care agencies, neighbors, or family members who can step in should the home care worker be late or absent from work.
Respite care services can be arranged through your Area Agency on Aging. While home care may not necessarily be less expensive than nursing home care or assisted living, it offers older people and their families the opportunity to remain at home and together.