When we first heard of direct-care workers in the South Bronx, New York, being tracked by GPS, we thought of George Orwell’s “Big Brother.”

But when we spoke to workers and to a manager at Cooperative Home Care Associates, an affiliate of PHI that recently ran a successful pilot test of the system, we decided this was a good use of cell phone technology.

For one month, 16 workers used cell phones given to them by CellTrak Technologies to clock-in on the job instead of calling in from the patient’s house phone.

Worker Reaction

Karey Glover, a home health aide who participated, said the system could use some fine tuning, but that she caught on pretty fast. Plus, the GPS system lets her employer know for sure she is where she claims to be.

“It proved I was really at work and I was on my job,” she said.

Thanks to the GPS technology, the system also provides added safety for the workers, who can call the office if they are lost or 911 if they are in trouble.

“The buildings you work in can be kind of dangerous,” said Glover, who works mostly in the South Bronx.

Benefits to the Employer

The benefit to the employer is that the system is more efficient and saves on hundreds of time sheets and data entry, said Raphael Lozada, information management manager at CHCA. Mostly, it improves on overall worker management, he said.

“The advantages of that jumped at us,” he said. “We are eager to move forward with this.”

CHCA is the largest owner co-op in the country with more than 1,000 employees, most of whom are women.