In last week’s reader poll we asked which presidential candidate would best prepare America to care for its aging population. So far, 81 percent of readers have chosen Barack Obama.
Although neither candidate has provided a detailed plan for dealing with this crisis, Obama has at least acknowledged the significance of direct care work by walking a day in the shoes of home care worker Pauline Beck and by choosing to feature Beck as a speaker at his nominating convention.
Why do you think Obama is so heavily favored?
Are you a McCain supporter? Tell us why you think he would do a better job.
One hour into the final presidential debate last night, Barack Obama answered a question about the country’s health care crisis, remarking that the issue “will break your heart over and over again.”
The candidates took this final debate opportunity to mention ideas like putting health care records online, establishing more walk-in clinics, and the need to address childhood obesity.
What they didn’t mention was the issue of long-term care.
Well… The presidential debates are over and the general election is fast approaching. Given the limited amount we’ve heard from our candidates on long-term care, do you have an opinion on who would better address this issue? Who do you think will best prepare America to care for its aging population?
Some facts to consider:
The population over 65 will more than double between 2000 and 2030.
By 2016, America will need more direct-care workers than teachers from K-12.
Real wages for personal and home care aides are falling while worker demand increases.
Direct care workers are twice as likely to be uninsured than other workers
Nursing homes lose up to 70% of their workers to turnover each year.
Nursing aides, orderlies, & attendants are over 400% more likely to experience an injury than the average worker.
Advocates for quality direct-care jobs don’t usually find their issues on the ballot, but voters in the state of Washington are being asked to weigh in this year.
The Olympian reports that Initiative 1029—which calls for increased training of workers who provide long-term medical care—is one of the more surprising issues on the Nov. 4 general election ballot.
The initiative was originally intended for the legislature, but when lawmakers failed to act, supporters took the issue directly to the people. They collected 300,000 signatures to put the measure on the ballot.
On October 6, a story by the Philadelphia Inquirer examined the challenges faced by Karen Goroncy (pictured left), a 51-year-old home health aide in Pennsylvania without health coverage.
The next day, Garrison Keillor (pictured below), best known for his radio show “A Prairie Home Companion” and his stories of Lake Wobegon, referenced Goroncy’s situation in a a story for his nationally syndicated column.
Keillor commented in his usual folksy way:
“In Philly, a woman earns $10.30/hour to care for a man brought down by cystic fibrosis. She bathes and dresses him in the morning, brings him meals, puts him to bed at night. It’s hard work lifting him and she has suffered a painful hernia that, because she can’t afford health insurance, she can’t get fixed, but she still goes to work because he’d be helpless without her. There are a lot of people like her. I know because I’m related to some of them.”
As the crisis in long-term care grows in severity, it’s encouraging to see the plight of direct-care workers drawing the focus of media and to see the importance of direct-care work being publicly recognized. Public recognition of the problem is an important step along the path to achieving the fundamental change we all know is necessary if America is to be prepared to meet the challenges presented by its rapidly aging population.
When a Google alert landed me at a long-term care blog I had never seen before, I was pleased to see that PHI’s 12 Steps for Creating a Culture of Retention (pdf) was featured on the homepage.
We sent an email to Basic American Comfort and heard back from Eric Raymond, a representative of GF Health Products, the long-term care bed and furniture manufacturer behind the new site.
Raymond said the blog educates their staff and sales force and creates a company-wide cultural awareness of long-term care issues.
“Despite being intimately involved in the tools designed to help caregivers, an astonishingly few take a real interest in the elderly or those who improve the quality of an aging population,” said Raymond.
Basic American Comfort aggregates stories from around the web, publishes original pieces, and is also open to submissions.
After his body went unclaimed for more than a week, workers at Mount Carmel Nursing Home in Manchester, New Hampshire recently gave an 89-year-old man a full military funeral.
re America to care for its aging population. So far, 81 percent of readers have chosen Barack Obama.
