The Home Health Care CEO

Tell us about Premier Care – its story, mission and the key services it provides.

Premier Care LLC is a fully bonded and insured, dedicated non-medical home care services provider licensed in Connecticut and New York. Premier Care was founded in October 2015 and has been successfully operating for the past 6 years.

Our services are provided in homes, assisted leaving and senior facilities. Premier Care operates on the belief that with the right kind of assistance and support, individuals can remain safely in their own homes, where people feel the greatest sense of purpose and they are most comfortable and happy. We provide hourly, overnight and 24 –hour care, all of which is tailored to the needs of our clients.

Our Mission Statement is to offer our clients personalised non-medical support services in their homes, assisting the elderly, disabled and others needing assistance to maintain their quality of life. Our services support clients in a spirit of concern for their welfare, gaining satisfaction and a sense of pride for the value that we add to their lives.

What were the challenges of providing in-home care during the pandemic?

Home health and home care agencies provide essential medical and supportive services to elders and people with disabilities, enabling them to live at home. Home-based care is an important alternative to facility-based care, especially for infection prevention during the COVID-19 pandemic. The majority of the home care workforce is comprised of aides, who also are vulnerable to COVID-19. There are limited data on the COVID-19 experience of home care agencies, clients and aides. Employed aides who tested positive for COVID-19, were symptomatic, and/or quarantined. Most agencies (98.7%) experienced a decrease in demand for home visits, reflecting clients’ concern about infection, family members assuming care duties, and/or aides being unavailable for work.

Simultaneously, managers’ workloads increased to develop more extensive infection prevention policies, procedures and workforce training and sourcing scarce personal protective equipment (PPE). The pandemic imposed substantial new infection prevention responsibilities on home care agencies, clients, and aides. Specific home care needs for future pandemic planning include complete information on the infection status of clients; ready access to affordable PPE and disinfectants; and guidance, tools, and training tailored for the industry. Home health care should be incorporated more fully into comprehensive healthcare and public health pandemic planning. During the past 2 years most administrative work, appointments and interviews were done by Zoom calls or using online services. The world became digital during the pandemic, life felt different, isolated, but we adopted the new lifestyle very quickly and safely. However, despite all of the challenges, we were able to maintain a relatively healthy environment within our agency, taking all necessary measures to provide our clients and caregivers with safety and wellbeing.

Are things improving now?

Things are still very challenging, complicated and out of our control. Home health care nurses and home care aides are stepping up protective measures. These include calling patients at home before they visit to see if they or anyone in the household have a fever or other symptoms of COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus. They’re also washing hands in front of patients and wearing masks and other protective gear to reduce infections and to make patients more comfortable about their precautions.” If anything, home health workers are often at more risk than the patients themselves, as they’re dealing with increased risk of exposure as well as the potential of losing their jobs due to patient fears.

Despite the fears, both rational and irrational, people must continue receiving their routine care. Health cannot be maintained if your basic needs aren’t met, so do what you can to protect your health by continuing to receive care. In the meantime, home health workers will continue to do what they do best: taking care of those who need it. Experts are saying that things will never go back to normal, but time will tell. Winter is cold and all viruses like Omicron, Delta, the flu, etc. are spreading wildly and many vaccinated and boosted clients and caregivers are still getting ill. We all are trying our best to survive the pandemic and still manage things in the best and safest way we can. We have an important role in many people’s lives. Our clients and caregivers are depending on us.

What are the most difficult and rewarding parts of being the CEO of Premier Care?

The most difficult part of being the CEO of Premier Care today is to maintain a healthy environment and survive the pandemic. The most important part during this time is to hire the right individuals and work on their training process, caregiver’s support and client satisfaction. We are maintaining an excellent reputation in the home health care field – we are maintaining a 5-star rating and good reputation, especially during such a challenging and complicated time. Premier Care is a rising star amongst many other competitors. We are planning to open new locations and expand our services nationwide in the future.