How to start a Home Caregiving service?
- Government Home Care starts with a call to the local health unit or the Community Access Line.
- If care is indicated the health unit will complete financial assessments to determine the daily (per-diem rate), if any, and a home safety assessment.
- A Case Manager will be assigned who authorizes hours of service to accomplish the care plan tasks and needs they are able to provide.
- Directions from the Case Manager go to the home care department for nurse review and scheduling.
- Government home care provides the most flexible services across the largest geographic area of availability Island-wide.
- It may take several days to weeks to begin service depending on capacity and availability for your geography.
- Private home care starts with Client or Family research into the local providers. We do this research every year and post it publicly to help in this process.
- Then spouse or family call to get information about services and make comparisons. Many providers refuse to provide basic information likes rates over the phone without a home visit.
- Once the family makes a decision there will be a service agreement to sign and a home safety visit to look for hazards in the home.
- If there is a nursing team they review the care plan tasks for clinical concerns.
- Then the schedulers review the care plan tasks and begin scheduling.
- Private home care providers often provide less flexible services with higher minimum visit durations and a limited geographic availability.
- Some Private home care providers can start same day or next day in emergencies.
- We provide all information about our services upfront. Nothing hidden.
- We sign the Service Agreement before coming to the home for the Home Safety Assessment.
- Initial care plans are reviewed by the Nursing Team for clinical concerns.
- Services are scheduled by the Coordination Team including same day service starts when required.
- We provide 1 hour visits with no weekly minimum and no subscription fees.
Pro-tip: We can arrange same day care in emergencies but the trade-off is that the caregivers able to come immediately are not necessarily the ones who can be assigned ongoing. Emergency service starts for same or next day are more likely to see an extra caregiver or two starting out.