You might be wondering how this Supreme Court decision adversely affects senior citizens, women and our economy. And here are the cold, hard facts…

Women: Living expenses are increasing. It’s getting harder to make ends meet. 80% of the 2.1 million home health care workers are women and minorities. If home health care workers cannot make a living wage, they will need to find different jobs or their families will suffer. This is especially true if you are a single mother.

U.S. Economy: If we don’t wake up and pay caregivers what they are worth, we will eventually lose much of the work-force to foreigners. Not surprisingly, it’s already happening. A large percentage of our country’s caregivers have come from India and Mexico. They get “fast-tracked” visas, so that Americans have enough caregivers to provide for our needs. This is not technically out-sourcing, because the foreign caregivers are employed within the U.S., but it still affects our economy.

People who come from other countries are likely to send much of their pay-check back to
their families. Unfortunately, the greenback’s worth is fading fast.
We need our dollars to stay in our country to support our economy, not
sent away to support other countries’ economies. Caregiving jobs should be included in the Fair Labor Standards Act and filled by Americans, not folks from Mexico and India.

Seniors: If a foreign caregiver does not speak proper English or if has an accent that is difficult to decipher, then seniors, the infirm and the disabled can be adversely affected. Quick, precise and understandable communication is an important part of caregiving. Accidents are more likely to occur without proper and timely communication. There is even more need for accuracy when administering medication, as many caregivers are required to do.

It seems that the Supreme Court cares little for those needing care or our economy, let alone the home health care workers. Instead, it looks as if they support the fat cats, as the unanimous June 11th Supreme Court decision was obviously in favor of employers and the corporate run, big biz, home health care industry.

HHC agencies testified that any changes in the status-quo would cost hundreds of millions of dollars per year, possibly resulting in service cuts. Oh really? More likely, paying overtime to struggling single mothers will cut into the “care” industry’s profits. Why not cut the CEO’s pay to make up the difference, if they’re so concerned about service cuts?

Another testimony given to the Court was from Tammy D. McCutchen, who was the Wage and Hour Administrator at the start of the Bush administration. She said, “We were concerned about burden on Medicare providers and recipients
and on the health care system generally, if overtime would have been
required.”

While Medicare might be spared a few dollars, it’s the home health care industry that really makes out. They know they can make big profits off the backs of their workers. Amazingly, according to a 2006 Genworth survey, in some parts of the country HHC agencies charge $292 per hour, while a worker may be paid as little as $6 per hour.

Thanks to the nine justices, home health care agencies can continue to pay appallingly low wages while presenting insurance companies and private payers with huge bills. Let’s keep in mind, Medicare and care recipients wouldn’t be affected if the HHC agencies simply paid their workers overtime, but didn’t charge more for their services. The agencies wouldn’t make such enormous profits, but the system would be fair to all.

Now, there’s no disputing that home health care workers are among the lowest paid of all service industry employees. But are you aware that these hard working people have no protection from discrimination, nor do they enjoy employment
benefits?

Yet home health care workers are expected to be patient, kind, discreet, honest, discerning, healthy, physically strong, and on call. They are the ones who risk life-long injury by lifting and transferring clients who can’t move; they change the stinky adult diapers filled with mounds of poo; they suffer verbal and physical abuse from ill-tempered clients; they are the ones who go without breaks or lunch if they have to work around their clients needs or rush from one client’s house to the next. These people help those who cannot help themselves. Who else will feed them, bathe them, dress them, toilet them, massage them, groom them and make sure they are stable, health-wise?

Home care workers provide all these necessary services, while getting no benefits, no travel pay and no overtime. No wonder American caregivers are leaving their jobs in droves. At the very least, all caregivers should be well respected and well paid. Better yet, they should be honored, stabbed in the back by wealthy judges who have lifetime job security!

Knowing this, you’d think the
Supreme Court would have made the opposite decision than the one they handed down June 11th. But then again, maybe not.

Seems as if since January 2001, every department and branch of our government has gone frighteningly awry. The Justice Dept. follows order
from the White House, instead of following the letter of the law; the
Surgeon General heeds warnings from the Bush Administration, instead of warning us about health dangers; the Environmental Protection Agency is told to loosen its requirements, at the expense of our water, land and air; our Constitution has been gutted, at the expense of our precious civil rights and the agencies that are supposed to be protecting Americans are now spying on us. So, in light of all that, why not keep a decent living from the people caring for our loved ones?

What do we have to
lose…..? The best care when we need it most?

What can we do to change this travesty of a ruling? Well, we can’t fire Supreme Court justices, although we should be able to if they keep making bogus rulings.

We can write or call the Department of Labor and demand that they reassess their interpretation of “companion services”. (Everyone in the Federal Government is supposed to work for us, right?) Tell them that home health care workers, aides and caregivers should not be exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Then get on the horn or write Congress.

Sen. Kennedy (D-Mass.), and chairman of the
Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, claims that he “intends to work with my Senate colleagues on a fair solution that treats these hardworking
caregivers with the dignity and respect they deserve.”

Shall we hold our breath?

Not on your life! We need to speak up loudly and insistently, if we want things changed. It’s up to us to keep squeaking until the wheel gets greased.

Technorati Tags: Women, caregivers, out-sourcing, Seniors, caregiver, Supreme Court, economy, home health care, home health care agencies

Carol Bursack of “Minding Our Elders” highlights the difficulties of long distance caregiving at this link:

Long-distance Caregiving: The Challenges

What is most important to consider is that long term care insurance can ease the caregiving burden by providing funds to hire help and facilities for your loved one – But the insurance must be obtained BEFORE it is needed.

Long term care insurance quotes can be gotten through the online Buyer’s Advocate Alliance.

Technorati Tags: Elders, caregiving, insurance

For over twenty years, Carol Bradley Bursack cared for a neighbor and six elderly family members, Through the years of caregiving and of eventual deaths she has come to know professionals in the field, as well as many other family caregivers. During this 20 year stint when Carol and her hubby were taking care of their parents, she became an astute student of the caregiving poccess, as many do. While Carol learned a ton about caregiving by actually being a caregiver herself, she questioned her feelings of guilt, frustration, burden and stress, aside her feelings of pride and a sense of accomplishment for a job well done.

It was the caregivers themselves who inspired and encouraged her to write “Minding Our Elders“, a journey which helped her develop the understanding and integrity to enter the final stage of her own life-cycle. In “Minding Our Elders” she turns to the heros in our midst, folks who have been there – done that, sharing in a delightfully well-crafted, easy going style not only her own touching experiences, but those of her caregiving peers. We get an all-too-needed view into what it’s like to grow older and need care, but also how the caregiving process is actually played out.

Ideally, between the laughter and tears, you yourself will gain a few insights of your own as you digest this heartwarming book.

According to a 2004 study by in a delightfully well-crafted, easy going style AARP and the National Alliance of Caregiving, over forty four million people age 18 and over provide care to another adult. Most are happy to help, but caregiving can become an overwhelming addition to an already busy life. These folks need support.

The purpose of “Minding Our Elders” is to offer a portable support group. Each story is self-contained. The stories are honest looks at many different care situations all with a common thread – that caregiving is both hard and personally rewarding work, at least in hindsight. These tales can give deep comfort, and they assure folks that they are, above all, not alone.

In the words of Erle Maisei, Ph.D. ,”America’s Baby Boomers will become increasingly familiar with the challenge of elder care, then of their own care. Carol Bursack’s compassionate stories help chart this difficult territory with grace and elegance.”

These touching stories highlight the need for long term care insurance which can ease the relentless burden on caregivers. Bursack’s book is now required reading for families and financial, social and health care professionals everywhere.

Bursak pens an elder care column, titled Minding Our Elders. for the local paper in Fargo, ND, and we can only hope more of her stories make it to the web.

Technorati Tags: Carol Bradley Bursack, family, caregiving, caregivers, caregiver, guilt, frustration, burden, stress, pride, accomplishment, Elders, heros, AARP, support, Elder, support group, Baby Boomers, elder care, Carol Bursack

A growing number of families are setting up caregiver contracts, in which relatives are formally hired to take care of elderly or disabled family members. These new arrangements, which can also be called personal-care or personal-service agreements, can help to reduce the size of a parent’s estate. They can also minimize battles between siblings and various family members. And for many other families, these contracts can help compensate for the huge amounts of time, effort and money that family members all-too-often often spend watching over and taking care of an elderly relative.

Amazingly, some 44.4 million adult caregivers, or over 21% of the U.S. adult population, now provide unpaid care to frail adults with disabilities. On average, those caregivers provide 21 hours of care a week, and what’s more, the average length of time spent providing care is 4.3 years.

Another reason to have a carefully-worded caregiver contract in place:

Recent legislation now makes it much tougher to qualify for Medicaid long-term-care assistance by faking impoverishment through outright gifts to family members. These laws were passed to prevent folks who have the means to pay for their own care from obtaining Medicaid, which is intended only for poor patients.

Attorneys say that if set up properly, a caregiver contract shouldn’t be considered as a gift to children, because the patient is receiving a true, real service in return.

Still, there’s stigma to overcome when recommending the idea to families. The main reason: Some people can still be uncomfortable with the idea of paying their own kids, say lawyers, and many folks choose to use long term care insurance coverage, instead of trying to fake their way onto the Medicaid welfare roles.

Technorati Tags: caregiver, relatives, elderly, disabled, family, parent, estate, money, relative, caregivers, disabilities, Medicaid, long-term-care, long term care insurance, coverage, welfare

While it’s said that those in the developing world have numerous children with the hope that some will survive to care for them when they’re old, those in developed counties have about two children.

Somehow I guess I thought our so-called developed world had some type of policies for elderly caregiving, but the United States simply doesn’t. While Medicare will take care of hospitalization for a heart attack, those who need chronic care for Parkinson’s disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease or heart failure just have to depend on family, pure and simple. After that, long term care insurance coverage is the only answer.

Boomers can purchase long term care insurance for their own future care, but this doesn’t help the greatest generation that needs care now. With no program to address chronic care, Medicaid, a welfare program for the proven poor, has become the default option for much long term care — nursing homes. So if a person has the $90,000 needed in New York state, he or she can enter a nursing home. But that money will be gone within two years, and Medicaid will then pick up the nursing home expenses. About 2/3 of Medicaid goes to pay nursing home care for those who have outlasted their money. But remember, over 40% of nursing home residents are under age 65.

“Nursing homes are the last resort — where a disabled person will go when a family caregiver can no longer care for the relative at home,” said a doctor.

Studies show that a decision to place somebody in a nursing home comes not when the person reaches some type of medical criteria; it’s when a caregiver can no longer give the care because of health or financial reasons.

And while most don’t have the money to place a relative in a nursing home, many of the 80 percent of U.S. caregivers don’t even want to go the nursing home route. Despite being regulated by government, nursing homes, with a very few exceptions, aren’t places most people want to go.

Family caregivers adding home care for the disabled to their many other responsibilities, suffer physically and mentally. A new report, “Study of Caregivers in Decline: A Close-up Look at the Health Risks of Caring for a Loved One”, details how the stress and worry about caregiving results in millions of caregivers neglecting their own physical and mental health, resulting in depression, fatigue, poor eating and exercise habits and greater use of alcohol, drugs and medications.

When these caregivers’ responsibilities and concerns are taken in the context of the responsibilities they also have for their own lives — including work and family — many caregivers are overwhelmed, and the stress can take the physical form of heart-attack scares, high blood pressure, acid reflux, headaches, arthritis flare-ups and other conditions, the report said.

I’ve articulated the caregivers’ predicament to 100s of policymakers and lawmakers, and for the most part, this problem is just not on their radar screen. There are a few expeditions, and ther are a few programs such as the National Family Caregiver Support Program, but an overall strategy of supporting caregivers, who supply more than $257 billion in care each year, simply does not exist. The answer that I keep getting is this: “it’s a societal problem.”

Meanwhile, where does a caregiver turn? Some of the forty six percent of caregivers who are now employed can turn to professional caregiving assistance via his or her employer, and some employers provide free, but limited, geriatric case managers to assist employees in negotiating thi path of family caregiving, but it can be costly.

For example, the home assessment costs $580, and a case manager earns an hourly rate of $125/hour.

In California, Caregiver Resource Centers provide someervices free or at low cost, including social workers to assess the caregiving situation for current and future needs.

Those with access to a free home assessment should take advantage of it, especially before a health crisis occurs, and folks without long term care insurance coverage can get personal advice and free comparative rate quotes through the online Buyer’s Advocate.

Technorati Tags: caregiving, Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, heart failure, Boomers, long term care insurance, generation, long term care, nursing homes, nursing home, money, Medicaid, disabled

A report released by the International Longevity Center USA and the Schmieding Center for Senior Health and Education found that 20% of elderly patients currently lack access to family and professional caregiving and that the shortage will explode in the future. In addition, this report, titled “Caregiving in America,” reveals that caregiver wages are among the lowest in America, an indication that U.S. residents most likely will not be willing to take these low-wage jobs in the future. Nursing aides received an average hourly wage of $10 in 2004, plus unskilled, home-based caregivers received an even lower average hourly wage, according to the report. Another report released by the National Association of Area Agencies on Aging shows that nearly half of U.S. cities have no plans whatsoever to meet the health care and other needs of aging baby boomers.

Researchers surveyed more than 1,790 U.S. cities, and they found that one-third do not provide any access to counseling on prescription drugs, health screenings, or health education for elderly residents. The number of U.S. residents ages 65 and older are projected to reach almost 72 million by 2030.

Caregiver Health

More than 2.5 million home-based, family caregivers experience stress, depression and health declines, according to a study released by the National Alliance for Caregiving. This study included an online survey of 528 family caregivers between July 21 and July 28, 2006 as well as in-depth discussion groups and phone interviews with caregivers. About 91% of the respondents said they had experienced depression, and 72% said they had not visited their physicians as much as they needed since they began to provide care for their elderly relatives. Family caregivers “are out there without anybody helping them”, and “They could get to the point where they can’t be a long term care giver anymore.” John Crews, a senior scientist at CDC, said, “People need help and respite. They need a break, and they need knowledge”.

Technorati Tags: caregivers, caregiver, baby boomers, counseling, prescription drugs, elderly, stress, depression, long term care, respite

- Former First Lady, Rosalynn Carter
on caregiving
Long Term Care insurance helps you get the care you deserve without being a burden on your family. Get your free, comparative rate quotes through your Buyer’s Advocate.

Technorati Tags: caregivers, caregiving, Long Term Care insurance

I watched it twice. Once by myself and once with my husband, Clay. I woke up this morning with very swollen eyes from crying so hard. What a tragic and inspirational documentary. Johnny Kennedy, the sly-witted, philosophical hero of this story endured horrific pain, whilst his steadfast mother provided unwaivering care his entire life. Being privy to his last days made me grateful for the life my hubby and I share. Even with it’s challenges we feel blessed, especially after seeing “The Boy Who’s Skin Fell Off” and realizing just how challenging our lives could be.

The documentary also got me to thinking about how dependent Clay is on me.

If, for instance, I were to die in my sleep how would he get out of bed? We have no friends or family who drop by. Even if they did, the doors would be locked and Clay would not be able to get out of bed to open them. He’d be stuck in bed with a decomposing wife. Yuck!!! Now, he’d probably like to see me lose some weight, but not quite in that manner.

I realized that we needed a phone by his side of the bed so that he could at least call for help! When we got up this morning I put our hand-held phone there, but now have to figure out a way to make sure he can pull it to him in case his hands can’t grip and he drops it.

Also, what if I were to get in an accident while out doing errands? Who would get him out of his chair, into bed, out of bed, cook, etc? We’re new to this community and it is quite evident that we need more of a support system. These are just thoughts that caregivers have, I guess. Morbid, perhaps, but necessary. Maybe it’s time he got an electric wheelchair and a lift for the bed. Independence of any sort would be a good thing.

I keep telling him that I’m not going anywhere, but it’s always good to be prepared.

Caregivers have their own set of enormous challenges, and the page above has a lot of great resources. As caregiver, Kimberly needs all the help & support she can get. I know all too well, because I see firsthand the stresses and strains that my bodily needs create. Caregiving is often not a picnic, and caregivers need to take advantage of all the tips, tools and techniques available.

Attempts at handling caregiving stresses alone, without professional and emotional support, can lead to even more sorry circumstances for all concerned.

Especially helpful will be the page called “Caring For the Caregiver” at:
http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~drstall/hndbk3.html#n6

Check it out. My love is with you…

- Clay

“Life is like photography. Use the negative to develop.” – Swami Beyondanada