The Spokane Journal of Business writes about the rise in clients returning to in-home care in the Spokane region following a steep decline at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in March of 2020. Home care companies in the area, Home Instead and Family Resource Home Care, speak about their experience and perspective on why they’re seeing this increase in demand.
Among the variables behind the uptick in clients lately, Family Resource CEO Jeff Wiberg states that the pandemic has had an especially devastating effect on seniors, as isolation methods have left many with worsening symptoms of existing conditions, mismanagement of medications, and concerning behaviors such as eating less healthily or decreased mobility due to fears of falling.
Spokane Home Instead franchise owner Christie Amans purports that the recent increase in client returns to home care could be due to families experiencing pandemic burnout with working full-time jobs, schooling children at home, on top of caregiving for senior relatives.
While the in-home care industry naturally ebbs and flows, this current increase in demand for services has left some providers in the Spokane area unable to keep up. Jeff Wiberg added, “We could hire 50 more caregivers in Spokane. Our ability to hire has not kept up with the demand.”
Yet, anyone can become a caregiver. Amans states, “To become a licensed caregiver, a person must take 75 hours of online training, 16 hours of skills training. An additional eight hours of dementia training and eight hours of mental health classes are also required.” From there, aspiring caregivers just need to pass a state test.
Read the full article here.
