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This year, home health organizations have a new tool to mark the National Council on Aging‘s (NCOA) third annual Falls Prevention Awareness Day on September 23, the first day of fall.

The Fall Prevention Awareness: Enhanced Training Curriculum for Home Health Aides now augments the list of NCOA Falls Prevention Resources.

The curriculum, a joint project of PHI and NCOA that was released this spring, is available at no charge.

Meets In-Service Requirements

Uniquely designed for adult learners, the training curriculum is designed to help home health aides across the country reduce falls and minimize injury to their clients by increasing their awareness of the risk factors for common falls and enhancing their communication skills.

Participants learn to build on their existing knowledge and skills by strengthening their “observe, record, report” skills and developing communication skills that help them address with their clients how to reduce the risk of falling.

“There is no better time than Falls Prevention Awareness Day for home care leaders and managers to commit to train home health care aides on how to help their clients to prevent falls in and outside the home,” said PHI National Director of Curriculum and Workforce Development Peggy Powell.

“As the home health aides enhance their ability to view clients through a fall-prevention lens, they also learn how to reduce their own risk of falling — unfortunately, too common an occurrence in home care work.

“When home care agencies offer falls prevention education, they address an important health and safety issue for clients and aide staff alike. The PHI/NCOA Falls Prevention Awareness curriculum contains all of the materials you need to conduct an in-service training for home health aides, and it’s just a click away,” Powell said.

The downloadable course includes two three-hour sessions that employers can use to meet in-service requirements.

Leading Cause of Death by Injury

Falls are the leading cause of death by injury for older Americans. They threaten the lives, safety, and independence of older adults and have an enormous impact on the cost of health care.

“When older adults fall, it often leads to a loss of independence, reduced mobility, and earlier admission to a nursing home,” said Lynn Beattie, vice president of Injury Prevention at NCOA, and national director of the Falls Free^TM Coalition. “But the good news is, through appropriate risk management, falls are largely preventable.”

PHI is among the 70 national organizations and 31 state coalitions from 35 states that have joined the Falls Free^TM Coalition.

– by Deane Beebe

A home health aide in training

A new study by Pennsylvania State University researchers found that home health aides who had training are less likely to be injured on the job, and aides who felt they did not have good support from their supervisors were also more likely to suffer injuries.

The researchers also concluded that home health aides who had not experienced on-the-job injuries had a higher rate of job satisfaction and lower turnover “intentions.”

Benefits of Training

The study found that how employees felt about their workplace and training affected the probability of injuries. Employees who felt that their training had not prepared them well enough for the job were three times more likely to be injured than employees who thought that their training prepared them well.

The aides who felt their training prepared them well, not only had lower workplace injury rates, but they were also more likely to rate their organization highly as a place to work and seek services from.

“What this suggests is that investing finances into soft resources can have tangible benefits to organizations,” Deirdre McCaughey, assistant professor of health policy and administration at Penn State and lead author on the study, said in a press release about the study.

“Organizations tend to cut back on spending on soft resources, especially during hard economic times, because there is usually no tangible benefit,” she continued.

Good Supervisor Support

How home health aides perceived the support they got from their supervisors also affected on-the-job injuries, reported the study’s authors. The aides who felt they had poor supervisor support were one-and-a-half times more likely to have one injury, and three times as more likely to have three injuries, than the aides who considered their supervisors to be supportive.

“The study confirms what PHI has found it its own work over 20 years — that well designed adult-learner centered training and good supervisory supports improve retention and job satisfaction,” said PHI National Director of Curriculum and Workforce Development Peggy Powell.

The Penn State researchers analyzed data from the nationally representative 2007 National Home Health Aide Survey, which was funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The research findings were reported at the 2010 Academy of Management (AOM) Annual Meeting on August 9.

“Who Needs Caring? We Do! Workplace Injury and Its Effect on Home Health Aides,” was selected as a “Best Paper” for the AOM’s Annual Meeting Proceedings. The conference proceeding article can be purchased for $20 by contacting the AOM Communications and Publishing Coordinator at mdavis@pace.edu.

Visit PHI’s Training and Organizational Development Services website for more information, including PHI Coaching Supervision^SM (pdf).

– by Deane Beebe

Direct-care workers in training

The House Committee on Financial Services passed the Public Housing Reinvestment and Tenant Protection Act of 2010 (H.R. 5814) on July 27, which includes provisions to fund training for public housing residents to become home health and personal care aides.

If enacted, a three-year, federal pilot grant program would be established to train public housing residents to provide home health and personal care services and supports to public housing and federally assisted rental housing residents who are elderly or living with a disability, including veterans.

Home care providers, community health centers, faith-based organizations, labor organizations, public housing agencies, and state and local government agencies that have established — or provide assurances that they will establish — an employment training program would be eligible to apply for a grant.

The funding is targeted to programs that primarily serve urban, rural, or Indian populations, as well as people in Puerto Rico or the U.S. Islands.

Under the act, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) would receive $2.5 million for distribution in each fiscal year: 2011, 2012, and 2013.

Recognizing Workers’ Needs

In addition to supporting home health and personal care aide training, the grant money could also be used to cover transportation and child care expenses for the public housing residents in the training programs.

“This model recognizes the needs that many home care aides have as they transition to work, particularly child care and transportation,” said PHI New York State Policy Director Carol Rodat. “Funding for these critical supports is seldom available, which is why the grants envisioned in this legislation are so important.”

Income earned from providing home care services will apply toward the public housing residents’ eligibility for federal housing on a graduated basis for the first three years, with no income applying in the first year.

These provisions of the Public Housing Reinvestment and Tenant Protection Act of 2010, sponsored by Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), were taken from the Together We Care Act of 2009, introduced by Rep. Nydia Velázquez (D-NY) in December 2009 and cosponsored by Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), the Financial Services Committee Chair, and Waters.

“Home care is a profession that will be in high demand for years to come and this legislation will offer hard-working public housing residents the tools they need to enter this field,” said Velázquez when she introduced the Together We Care Act last December.

– by Deane Beebe

PHI and the National Council on Aging (NCOA) have launched a new partnership to provide — at no cost — a Fall Prevention Awareness curriculum for home health care workers. Read the full story

Members of the CHCA Policy Action Group (PAG)

Members of the Cooperative Home Care Associates‘ Policy Action Group (PAG) met with New York state legislators in Albany on February 23 and 24 to discuss the unfair treatment of home health aides. Read the full story

Two agencies in Philadelphia have been awarded federal funding for home health aide training through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA). Read the full story