PHInational.org

Mississippi State House in Jackson

Hundreds of AARP Mississippi members participated in a demonstration at the state capitol building on March 27 for increased funding for home and community-based services (HCBS).

The 200-plus demonstrators urged Governor Phil Bryant (R) and state legislators to commit more money to such services, which allow elders and people with disabilities to receive care in their own homes and communities rather than in nursing homes.

Last year, former governor Haley Barbour (R) had pledged to use the state’s entire Medicaid budget surplus, then estimated to be $42 million, to fund HCBS. The actual surplus turned out to be $32 million.

Bryant, however, decided to devote just $16 million of that money to HCBS, with the rest going to education and mental health services.

AARP Mississippi State Director Sherri Davis-Garner told the Clarion-Ledger that AARP simply wants the state to “deliver on [its] promise of another $16 million.”

Davis-Garner noted that because nursing home care is far more expensive than home care, greater funding for HCBS would save the state money in the long run.

– by Matthew Ozga

PHI has been awarded two major grants from longtime supporters The Robin Hood Foundation and The Atlantic Philanthropies.

Robin Hood’s one-year commitment, totaling $1,175,000, supports efforts by PHI and its home care affiliate, Cooperative Home Care Associates (CHCA), to train more than 440 people for quality jobs as home health aides. The award targets primarily unemployed women, helping them make the often-difficult transition to long-term employment in a challenging economy.

The Atlantic grant will strengthen PHI’s overall capacity, and support federal and state policy work to improve the quality of eldercare and disability services. This will include direct policy advocacy on behalf of direct-care workers and the people they serve, as the nation’s political landscape evolves over the next three years. The award totals $1.4 million over a 38-month period.

In response to these grant awards, PHI President Steven L. Dawson said, “The strained economy is posing huge challenges for nonprofits, and more importantly for low-income workers and their families, elders, and individuals with disabilities. At this difficult time, it is particularly critical that we secure new funding for PHI’s work to support vulnerable populations.”

Intersection of Two Critical Fields

“PHI’s work is unique in that it operates at the intersection of two fields that are critical to the future of the United States, and to the lives of some of its poorest residents: low-income workforce development, and the nation’s eldercare and disability services system,” Dawson said.

Each grant provides targeted support for PHI’s work in one of these fields. Robin Hood’s grant supports workforce development — specifically, PHI’s work with CHCA to train and support low-income individuals for quality home health aide jobs in New York City.

The Atlantic grant, meanwhile, strengthens PHI’s national efforts to help direct-care workers provide better health care and long-term care for frail older adults, particularly for those who live in poverty.

“PHI and its affiliates help hundreds of women each year to secure quality jobs in the home care industry,” said Suzi Epstein, managing director of jobs and economic security for Robin Hood. “Many face significant barriers to employment, and these jobs provide women and their families with essential resources and supports to face a difficult recession.”

– by Brian DiPaolo

PA advocates (L-R): Edith Osterholm; Jessie Van Swearingen; Christine Gessner; Dan Haimowitz; Brenda Nachtway; Joe Angelelli; Adam Wolf Axler, Legislative Assistant to Rep. Joe Sestak

– by Joe Angelelli, Ph.D., PHI Pennsylvania State Director

On World Alzheimer’s Day, September 21, I was in Washington with 40 other advocates representing the 28 national organizations of the Eldercare Workforce Alliance (EWA).

It was the EWA’s second annual education day on Capitol Hill, as state delegations of family caregivers, geriatricians, educators, nurses, psychologists, pharmacists, social workers, direct-care workers, gerontologists, physical therapists, and other long-term services and supports professionals visited the offices of our representatives in the House and Senate. We met with congressional staffers and shared our caregiving stories, and listened to some of their own.

Individuals and organizations from a broad spectrum are working together in an unprecedented way to engage older adults, their families, and other unpaid caregivers about the critical need to address our nation’s worsening eldercare crisis. Our purpose that day was to request full funding of geriatric education programs under Title VII and Title VIII of the Public Health Service Act, and to provide information about the EWA’s endorsement of the Direct Care Workforce Empowerment Act and the Positive Aging Act (pdf).

Florida advocates (L-R): Patricia Wallace, Nurse; Terri Bucher, Nurse; Kathy Hyer, Professor; Lisa Brown, Psychologist; Denise Gammonley, Social Worker

A Unifying Experience

It was an honor to participate with my fellow Pennsylvanians. We made for a spirited team that included two veteran direct-care workers, a physical therapy professor, a medical social worker, a geriatrician, and me, a gerontologist. Early on we learned that all of us were at some point recently direct caregivers to family members and friends. That unifying experience permitted us to speak from the heart with the hard-working staff of our representatives, to point out that we’re all in this together, and to urge action with the first baby boomers turning 65 in just a few months.

Well into the afternoon we were just six people with tired feet walking the hushed halls and sunlit sidewalks of Congress, but together — as part of the EWA — we did our part to advocate for a caring and competent eldercare workforce, one that provides high-quality, culturally sensitive, person-directed and family-focused care.

(L-R) Paul Malhausen, physician; Nancy Lundebjerg, Deputy Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of the American Geriatrics Society and co-convener of the Eldercare Workforce Alliance; John Hale, public policy director, Iowa Caregivers Association

Workforce Priorities Outlined

The geriatrics workforce priorities of Title VII authorized by the Affordable Care Act, and for which the EWA was seeking appropriations to be implemented, include:

• An expansion of the number of disciplines eligible to apply for a Geriatric Academic Career Award
• A supplemental grant award program to Geriatric Education Centers to train additional faculty through a mini-fellowship program
• A requirement that Geriatric Education Centers provide training to caregivers and/or direct-care workers
• A geriatric training program for physicians, dentists, and behavioral and mental health professions
• A geriatric career incentive program to provide grants to foster greater interest among a variety of health professionals in entering the field of geriatrics, long-term care, and chronic care management
• A program administered by the Department of Health and Human Services to offer advanced training opportunities for direct-care workers.

Title VIII includes the Nursing Workforce Development programs, supporting:

• Additional training for nurses who care for older adults
• Development and dissemination of curricula relating to geriatric care and training of faculty in geriatrics
• Continuing education opportunities for nurses practicing in geriatrics.

The Affordable Care Act also creates traineeships for advanced practice nurses pursuing long-term care, geropsychiatric nursing or other areas that specialize in care of older adults.

Helen Hanson, Home Care Worker

Direct-care worker Helen Hanson, a long-time friend of PHI, wrote about planned federal spending cuts — and how they will affect Maine’s direct-care workforce — in a recent issue of The Times Record in Maine. Read the full story

On April 27, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and The Hitachi Foundation jointly received the 2010 Critical Impact Award from The Council on Foundations, in recognition of their work on a program that benefits frontline healthcare workers. Read the full story