Tag Archive for 'California'

VIDEO: Home Care Worker Speaks at Democratic Convention

Published
by
alee
on August 28, 2008
in PHI Blog
. 0 Comments

Tuesday night at the Democratic Convention in Denver, I saw a special speaker take the floor around 6:15. Her name is Pauline Beck, and she is a home care worker in Oakland, California.

Ayear ago, Barack Obama spent a day on the job with Pauline, as part of the SEIU’s Walk a Day in My Shoes initiative. Pauline, who referred to the candidate as “my friend,” spoke passionately about her belief in his ability to change America and help people like herself. “I’ll never forget the day I spent working with Senator Obama, and I know he won’t either,” she said.

“My job is to help people, and I love my job, but being a home care worker is hard,” Pauline told the delegates. “The wages are low, the hours can be long, and the work can be physically challenging…. Workers need a president who stands up for us.”

As the energy and anticipation spread through the crowd, it was thrilling to see a direct-care worker take on such a prominent role. The fact that this workforce was highlighted is a very promising sign: We could be in for some significant, much-needed changes in long-term care policy over the next few years.

Allison Lee, National Campaign Manager
Health Care for Health Care Workers
alee@phinational.org

Study Shows Link Between Health Care and Retention

Published
by
enakhnikian
on August 22, 2008
in PHI Blog
. Closed

“There is now a consistent pattern of data showing that homecare workers receiving benefits have a lower rate of attrition and, therefore, a higher rate of stability,” says the latest report from the Los Angeles County In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) program.

Impact of Health Benefits on Retention of Homecare Workers: Analysis of the IHSS Health Benefits Program in LA County (pdf) is a follow-up to four reports from 2003-2006, which showed that offering medical benefits to the IHSS home care workers reduced turnover.

The present study, a five-year longitudinal retention analysis, echoes those findings. It also teases out more detail, comparing work patterns for workers who enrolled in the benefits program with those who did not, identifying traits that predict who will enroll, tracking changes in enrollment over time, and more.

The findings are significant because “The success of any kind of in-home supportive services depends on having an experienced and well-trained and committed workforce - you can’t have people stay out of institutions if there’s no workforce to take care of them at home,” says Joanne Holland, a senior clinical specialist at RTZ Associates Inc. “It’s such important work, but it’s not a high-paying position. And a lot of people are able to stay in the work because of these health care benefits.”

The study found that nearly half (45%) of the workers who enrolled in the plan were still in the workforce at the five-year mark, compared with only about a third (35%) of those who were eligible for benefits but had not enrolled.

“The stability of the workforce means you have better workers because they’re been doing it longer,” adds Holland. “It also makes for better relationships with consumers, so it’s a better experience for them.” RTZ Associates wrote the report.

Comment below, or see PHI’s Health Care for Health Care Workers blog for more comments.

Elise Nakhnikian, PHI, Senior Online Editor
enakhnikian@phinational.org

PAS Center Grant Funds Continuing Research on Direct-Care Workers

Published
by
enakhnikian
on July 17, 2008
in PHI Blog
. 1 Comment

A newly awarded federal grant will fund continuing research and analysis on how to strengthen and support the personal assistance services workforce.

The University of California San Francisco’s five-year-old Center for Personal Assistance Services (PAS Center) learned last week that is has been funded for another five years by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research. In a news release about the grant, Charlene Harrington (pictured), the Center’s director and principal investigator, describes the center’s goal as “providing support so that people with disabilities can live and work independently in their community, as opposed to being institutionalized in a nursing home.”

Starting this October, the center will focus on three areas under the $4.25 million grant: improving access to PAS by individuals with disabilities; improving the workforce to support individuals with disabilities, and understanding the complexities of the economics of PAS. The center has done research documenting low wages, a scarcity of health care benefits, and high turnover rates among PAS workers.

Continue reading ‘PAS Center Grant Funds Continuing Research on Direct-Care Workers’

California Rate Increase Doesn’t Reach DCWs

Published
by
enakhnikian
on May 10, 2008
in PHI Blog
. 0 Comments

California nursing homes earned considerably more money from Medicaid after reimbursement rates were raised, but the money didn’t benefit direct-care workers or residents, according to a study by Charlene Harrington and colleagues at the University of California San Francisco. In fact, wages for nursing assistants actually fell slightly when adjusted for inflation, and patient care measures declined in several areas.

Medi-Cal reimbursements were increased by a law passed in 2004. In 2006, the first full year when the higher rates were in place, Harrington conducted her study. She found that average nursing home revenues had increased from $124 to $152 a day, but nursing assistant wages had not quite kept up with inflation. Meanwhile, the amount spend on patient care fell by 3.5 percent, according to Impact of California’s Medi-Cal Long Term Care Reimbursement Act on Access, Quality and Costs.

“The fact that they let the nursing assistant wages actually decline with inflation, I think there’s no excuse for that,” Harrington told the Los Angeles Times. “They’re the bulk of the workers and they’re the lowest-paid.”

But several other long-term care stakeholders - including a lobbyist for the Service Employees International Union, which helped push for the increased reimbursement - told the paper that the study was premature. Higher reimbursement rates had only just begun when it was conducted, they pointed out, and homes had had to wait for up to two years for the bump, making them wary of increasing fixed costs such as wages. Adding to their wariness, they say, is the fact that the law will expire next year unless the legislature renews it.

And yet, the article notes, the homes did increase some wages. Administrators now earn 13 percent more, and licensed nurses 9 percent more.

Elise Nakhnikian, Senior Online Editor
enakhnikian@phinational.org

Consumer-Directed Workers Need Help with On-the-Job Injuries

Published
by
enakhnikian
on May 2, 2008
in PHI Blog
. 1 Comment

Many of the direct-care workers who provide consumer-directed care in California cannot access workers’ compensation assistance when they are injured on the job, according to a recent study. And that finding has “important implications for workers’ health and the sustainability of consumer-directed programs-within and beyond California,” according to authors Teresa Scherzer and Nicole Wolfe of the University of California, San Francisco, PAS Center.

The problem will only grow worse as consumer-directed programs gain in popularity, the authors warn, unless systems are put in place to ensure that injured workers get the help they are entitled to. “Building on the recommendations we present to more effectively respond to occupational injury would be a feasible first step,” they write in “Barriers to Workers’ Compensation and Medical Care for Injured Personal Assistance Service Workers.”

Continue reading ‘Consumer-Directed Workers Need Help with On-the-Job Injuries’

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