Home Care Heroes Blog

The True Spirit of Home Care - by Elizabeth Hogue

Home care attorney Elizabeth Hogue has helped our industry navigate through all types of tough challenges and shares her sage guidance willingly through her frequent emails.  We found this story of hers to be particularly poignant, please enjoy!
 
Some of you may recall an account of what I call "the true spirit of home care," as follows:
 
hands-1939895_1920A home health aide in Maine visited a patient in the dead of winter. The main room of the patient's home was heated by a wood stove while the doors to the remainder of the rooms were closed, including the door to the only bathroom. The aide prepared to give the patient a bath. When she entered the bathroom she found a dead bear in the bathtub. This was not surprising to her because she knew that the bear was part of a source of food for the patient and family during the winter. But how was she going to give the patient a bath with a bear in the only bathtub?
 
The aide had a Hoyer lift that she used for the patient and quickly realized that she could use the lift for the bear, too. So she used the lift to remove the bear from the bathtub and move the patient into and out of the bathtub. Then she used the lift again to put the bear back in the bathtub where it "belonged."
 
And this, my friends, is part of the true spirit of home care! It's that "can do" attitude that says we will do whatever is necessary to meet the needs of our patients. "Whatever it takes" might be the motto of many home care providers. There is another aspect of the true spirit of home care that is equally important.
 
Recently, an agency needed an experienced staff member to assist with billing on a part-time basis, but wasn't having any luck identifying such a person. A competitor employed an experienced biller who worked only four days per week. When the competitor heard about the need for an experienced biller, the competitor volunteered its biller to the agency.
 
And this, my friends, is also what the true spirit of home care is all about: the willingness to assist fellow providers, even competitors, with crucial functions of agency operations. Generosity of spirit; graciousness; value clearly placed on relationships with fellow providers and the success of the industry as a whole.
 
The true spirit of home care, as I call it, makes us strong and provides a sound basis for a future that is good for patients and providers in the industry. In a "Disrupt" podcast on January 11, 2019, presented by Home Health Care News, Bill Dombi describes home care as "the best place to be." Yes, indeed! And to all of you who embody the true spirit of home care, we say a resounding, "Thanks!" You know who you are!
 
©2019 Elizabeth E. Hogue, Esq.  All rights reserved.
 
No portion of this material may be reproduced in any form without the advance written permission of the author.

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Ankota provides software to improve the delivery of care outside the hospital, focusing on efficiency and care coordination. Ankota's primary focus is on Care Transitions for Readmission avoidance and on management of Private Duty non-medical home care. To learn more, please visit www.ankota.com or contact us.

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