AARP Forecasts Significant Caregiver Shortage as Baby Boomers Age

AARP, formerly the American Association of Retired Persons, does a good deal of research on topics of interest to elder Americans.  I came across an interesting research paper from the AARP Policy Institute entitled The Aging of the Baby Boom and the Growing Care Gap: A Look at Future Declines in the Availability of Family Caregivers.  You can read the full paper here. 

A Picture Paints 1,000 Words

If you don't have the time to read the paper in its entirety, here's the summary:

• People are living much longer than in the past
• Family sizes are getting smaller
• Baby Boomers are retiring at a rate close to 10,000 people per day

Here's the message in graphical form:

Aging Population

Ratio of Available Caregivers

What Does This Mean for Home Care?

The takeaways for home care are as follows:

1. Your market is growing, but
2. Your available Caregiver Pool is shrinking, and so
3. You'll need to think about new models:

•  Route Optimization for Caregiver Travel
• Client self-monitoring and "TeleCare" capability

What Are You Doing to Prepare Your Agency for the Future?

Ankota focuses on home care agencies who are looking to futureproof their businesses with capabilities like those listed above and agencies looking to position themselves to manage care transitions.  Let us know if we can help. 

As a start, you can download our white paper, Why Care Transitions Is The Next Big Thing for the Home Care Industry.  Just click the link to download.