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If you are searching for private duty senior/elderly in home care in the Dallas TX – Fort Worth TX area and only needing shifts less than four hours, then this article will prepare you for the challenges to come. Your two biggest challenges will be finding a private duty home care agency, home health agency or home health care agency that does shifts for less than four hours and then ensuring a high level of continuity of home health care by a caregiver.
Care Mountain is a licensed 24/7 home care agency and one of the very few home care agencies in the Dallas TX – Fort Worth TX area where you can get a reliable private duty caregiver for shifts less than four hours – get a caregiver for as little as a one hour shift. Since most home health agencies have a four hour shift minimum, some wanting less have also tried consumer direct to caregiver services such as Carelinx, Care.com or SeniorAdvisor.com.
Some of the more common reasons seniors/elderly are needing in-home care and home health care for shifts less than four hours include assistance with bathing/personal hygiene, assistance with medications, transportation to medical appointments, assistance coordinating appointments, assistance with lite household chores, wellness checks, elderly/senior companionship, meal preparation, physical therapy and monitoring health conditions such as vital signs.
If you have a long term care insurance policy then you likely have a grace, or out of pocket, period lasting 60 to 90 days. Since this period is usually defined in days, many policy holders will try to get through this period spending as little money as possible by using as little hours as possible per day – often times just one hour per day. Finding a reliable home health caregiver for less than four hours a shift can save a lot of money during this paying out of pocket period. This tends to apply to long term care insurance policies with companies such as John Hancock, Metlife, New York Life, Genworth, Mutual of Omaha, MassMutual, Bankers Life, UNUM, CNA and Northwestern Mutual.
Ensuring the in-home care caregiver you choose will provide a high level of reliable continuity of care for shifts less than four hours involves a personal interview of the caregiver, fair pricing and assurances the caregiver will be close to you at the time needed. These factors are based upon 33+ years experience as a provider of in-home care to seniors/elderly.
In your interview with a prospective caregiver you should get a comfortable level of security that short shifts such as yours makes longer term sense to the caregiver, and it’s not just something the caregiver sticks to until something better comes along. Without this assurance, you can be facing a high level of caregiver turnover which affects quality of care – especially in the time of COVID-19.
For shifts less than four hours, you will find the strongest correlation between price and caregiver quality/continuity. You won’t regret offering the caregiver a rate on the higher end of the price range in these short shift cases!
Setting your in-home care visit schedule up so that it aligns with your caregiver being in a nearby location at that time is very important. Scheduling flexibility on your part will definitely help. If the caregiver has to spend a lengthy amount of time traveling to a shift less than four hours, you probably won’t be willing, or able, to offer a price high enough to ensure the level of reliable continuity of care you want/need. With this in mind, you may want to call the front desk personnel at any nearby congregate facility for seniors/elderly (i.e.; nursing homes, assisted livings, senior communities, rehabilitation hospitals) and see which home health agency or caregivers are coming in to help residents in their facilities. These nearby visiting caregivers will need to sign in at the front desks and your sympathetic talk with the front desk personnel will hopefully get you the names of caregivers having a good reputation and willing to pick up a few extra nearby hours help you before, or after their assignments at the nearby facility.
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2020-10-16 07:14:30
Gagan Bhalla is the Executive Director of Care Mountain Home Health Care. For over 19 years, Care Mountain has offered dedicated expertise in senior in-home care in the Dallas Fort Worth area. Managing seven locations across Texas, Gagan has committed his life to enhancing the well-being of seniors and their families needing home health care. Through insightful articles and blogs, he shares his wealth of knowledge, empowering families to make informed decisions about home care. Trust Gagan’s experience to guide you on the path to compassionate and professional senior care.