Implications to Employers of Assistance for family care for the Elderly

Elderly persons in need of care are assisted in a home care setting rather than a health care facility, even though the care givers may be working away from home and leave the care receivers alone at home. This arrangement means that the employer has to give allowance for the care giver to interrupt their work for part of the day in order to call home and monitor their patients. The employee also has to interrupt work periodically in order to attend to the patent’s emergencies. Employees become limited in their travel to assignments away from the current stations.

Appropriate Employer Policies

Employers therefore need to have in place policies that are tolerant to home care givers. Some policies include allowing the employee personal use of the organization’s communication facilities, giving time off to the employee to attend to emergencies, not to compel the employee to shift to distant stations, and giving financial or insurance assistance to employees engaged in caregiving (Long Term Care, 2015). Employers could facilitate setting up of CCTV monitoring from work to assist in monitoring from the work place without having to leave the work place. Employers should arrange for make-up time when employees engaged in home care take time out, this way they remain productive to the organization.

Challenges of Assuring Quality Care

Many persons receiving long term care prefer family and friends to government assisted care for a number of reasons. The cost of staying at home is usually lower than the cost of health care facility (Mediline Plus, 2015). When a patient stays with relatives they do not have to pay for separate accommodation, or hire a caregiver or incur much cost on food. Many persons prefer to keep their kin at home where they can monitor them constantly in a loving environment and as a sense of obligation to relatives (Long Term Care, 2015). Moreover, home-based care receivers are able to pursue activities which are either rehabilitative, for example pet care and gardening, or economic, for example handcraft and childcare. Facilities at nursing homes and hospitals are inadequate and there is a shortage of geriatrists.

The main challenges posed to regulators in long term care are: lack of personnel to manage long term care facilities, lack of training for caregivers, inadequate monitoring of care giving practices in order ensure quality standards, providing assistance like allowance and medical support to caregivers, and sometimes a lack of health cover for people receiving long term care which would help offset cost of caregiving (Long Term Care, 2015).

Why Support for Government Assistance for Informal Caregivers

My take on government assistance to home care is that given the shortage of care givers, it is prudent to provide incentives to home care givers. Insurance should offset part of caregiving cost as part of medical insurance. Tax incentives could encourage more people to pursue a career in caregiving, and give them discount on medicare because they work in a health risk environment. Less tax and insurance rates for the caregivers would encourage people to care for their relatives at home without stretching public facilities or employing nursing caregivers. It is easier and cheaper to provide medication discounts and to train home-based caregivers (Mediline Plus, 2015). Home-based care reduces incidences of litigation for medical malpractices.

Reasons for Shortages of Health Personnel for Long-term Care

The shortages of long term health care personnel is attributed to a number of factors. Few doctors are keen to practice in geriatric care, that is, care for the elderly, mainly because there is less financial incentive to care for the elderly who often have less income. Many elderly persons have little or no income, the cost of their care is nearly twice as much the national average, and there is inadequate insurance for long term conditions. Generally long term care patients are difficult to monitor because either they or their care givers do not exercise due diligence in following instructions. The government does not provide adequate incentives to support personnel engaged in home care (Long Term Care, 2015).

Government Policies that can Help Attract More Workers

The government should enhance health care policies that are friendly to long-term care receivers and givers, especially the elderly. Working age persons should be compelled to take whole life insurance for their future medical care, in the same way they do for social security (Medicare, 2015). Doctors should have a ceiling price for their services in order to enable more people afford their services, and special allowances and incentives should be paid by the government to personnel engaged in long term care. Government should inject more funding towards medical support, such as home care, since most care receivers do not require continuous monitoring. Tax should be reduced on medicine and facilities for long term care receivers (Long Term Care, 2015).

Response to Student Answers

Student 2

I agree with your comments that there are many challenges including setting minimum standards of care, and getting personnel. It is also true that quality assurance is also hard to achieve because the elderly have different problems and different expectations of the quality of care, depending on their backgrounds. Government care givers should be held accountable for the standards of care given and inspections should be conducted regularly. Reports on health care for the elderly should be scrutinized and compared to the situation on the ground care.

Student 3

True, government should assist informal care givers, but it would need to first identify them. I also support financial assistance to the informal care giver, but I would rather the assistance went directly t the care giver. Again I agree with you that organizations should not scale down their retirement plans and benefits for employees. I would add that government should also support such initiatives and improve its own health care plans for the elderly.

References

Long Term Care,. (2015). Home, the Desired Setting for Elder Care. Longtermcarelink.net. Retrieved 19 October 2015, from https://www.longtermcarelink.net/article-2015-8-4-Home-the-Desired-Setting-for-Elder-Care.htm

Medicare,. (2015). Retrieved 20 October 2015, from https://www.medicare.gov/Pubs/pdf/10050.pdf

Mediline Plus, H. (2015). Home Care Services: MedlinePlus. Nlm.nih.gov. Retrieved 19 October 2015, from https://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/homecareservices.html