If you or someone you know has a parent or loved one who needs additional in home care,
you may ask yourself  where do you turn.  You may even ask yourself if you should get a
certified home health aide from a licensed agency or a reliable  family member or friend.
Before you decide on taking the latter, there are some important checkpoints you must
take into consideration.

• Accountability of the certified aide coming to the patient’s home on a timely
  and scheduled basis. With a certified agency, this is required and a family friend or relative can take this lightly.
• Flexibility of any changes that may arise due to doctor appointments,
  vacations, hospital visits. At an agency, many certified aides are aware of changes
  that can occur in schedules. Will a family friend be so understanding?
• Private Pay and what will it cost the family of the patient if they cannot receive
  assistance from the government? There are agencies out there who do take on private
  patients allowing the family of that patient enough days in the week for assistance
  without the approval of the government.
• Medicaid/Medicare and if the patient will be eligible to receive help from the
  government with the possibility of being denied services.
• Loyalty from the agency and certified home health aide in assuring the patient
  gets the best care for their health.
• Consistency from the certified home health aide and the duties they will fulfill.
• Security from the agency and certified home health aide that they can be trusted
  and the patient feels safe in their presence.
• Expertise from a professional agency that will diagnose the patient and their needs
  accordingly to receive the best care for optimal health.
• Return to Optimal Health as the final goal when hiring an agency. A patient wants
  to progress with their health, not fall back into a regressed state.  An agency willing to
  provide the best care for your loved one with exemplify this consistantly.

It is possible that to ask a family friend or relative to assist your loved one, but be mindful
that they most likely will not be certified and have no formal training or even a background
check on their services.  A person certified has gone through hours of mandated training and
scenarios of any type of patient.

Those are some tips on what needs to be considered when researching a licensed agency
whose business it to properly train home health aides and a potential friend with no
expertise in this field.  Even more so, we are talking about an organization that is in the
business of providing care to you for short or long (most often) term, as far as your needs
increase and if the medical situation worsens.

Once you have researched an agency that properly fits your needs, other questions may
start to arise.

What if my certified home health aide goes away on vacation or gets sick?
Licensed agencies can find substitutes or replacements for you so you never have to
worry about if your loved one will be okay.

Will the same certified home health aide be at the home? Can I request a
different aide to fit my loved one’s needs?
Licensed agencies offer you the same home health aide, provided that is what you want.
Licensed agencies work to make the match between you and the home health aide as
perfect as possible — so the needs of the patient are understood, the right language is
spoken,the right foods can be cooked and the right respect for customs and preferences
is shown. Licensed agencies are in the business of satisfying you, the customer. They
don’t want to lose you, so they will work very hard to accommodate your needs.

Who oversees the process of placing a certified home health aide with my
loved one?
Licensed agencies assign a registered nurse to each patient, and that nurse supervises
the aide, monitors the patient’s condition and medications, confers with the physician
and is an information resource for you.

But perhaps most importantly, licensed home health care agencies provide you with
highly trained expert aides who know how to do their job well before they enter your
home. They don’t learn at your expense. It is very important to look into all resources
to find out all that a home health care agency can offer you to assure you will receive
the best care necessary.