It’s time to find a home care plan for Mom and Dad. It’s a huge undertaking that can be overwhelming to navigate. The first question you may run into is the decision between working with a professional home care agency or hiring a private caregiver to provide care. Once you get in contact with Encore Caregivers, we’re sure you won’t be questioning that for long. We can help you understand the benefits of home care, and why working with a home care agency is the preferred choice for you and an older adult you love!
What’s the difference between the two?
There are many differences between working with a caregiver agency and hiring a private caregiver. However, the main difference is that a private caregiver is hired by and holds a contract directly with the family needing care, while professional agencies, like Encore Caregivers, hire, employ, and manage their own caregivers to provide care to families. Encore Caregivers thoroughly screens each of their employees. You can depend on the team at Encore Caregivers to provide thorough training at hire, as well as ongoing training to ensure skillsets remain sharp and aligned with the needs of the clients.
With this distinction, there are benefits in choosing a reputable, award-winning agency, such as Encore Caregivers, to care for an aging loved one that may help your decision-making process.
What are the benefits of a home care agency?
- Pre-vetted caregivers – It’s important to be able to trust the person you hire to care for a loved one. Home care agencies, such as Encore Caregivers, make sure their caregivers are vetted with regular background checks and ongoing oversight before they even make it into your home.
- Built-in backup – People get sick. It happens. With a home care agency, you have a full team of professional caregivers ready to step in if your regular caregiver has to take a sick day. On the other hand, if a privately-contracted caregiver is not able to work, the family will need to secure a backup plan for care.
- Availability of a Registered Nurse and Registered Dietitian – The creation of a custom plan for care with a home care agency often includes oversight by professionals to help improve wellness outcomes. For example, while many agencies provide non-medical care, Encore Caregivers also has a registered nurse (RN) and registered dietician (RD) on staff and easy to communication with. The caregivers that work with Encore Caregivers offer regular communication with trained professionals that will help you navigate this journey.
- Access to Resources – Working with the care professionals at Encore Caregivers also includes access to care resources that support your loved one’s unique and everchanging needs. With resources such as memory care best practices, connection with other local resources, the experience and practical strategies to manage everyday responsibilities fluidly, Encore Caregivers can help.
- Avoiding the legal work – When you choose to work with a private caregiver, you’re responsible for management and administrative tasks, such as managing taxes, withholding worker’s compensation insurance, and planning for liability risks. When working with a professional home care agency, these financial burdens and legal risks are handled for you.
- Long-term Care Insurance – Those who carry a long-term care insurance policy are encouraged to take a close look at the requirements for providers in order to make an informed decision. In order to engage the home care benefits, it is likely that certain strict criteria must be met. This may include administrative, liability, or training requirements; these are included benefits of engaging a professional home care agency.
- Expertly trained caregivers – A good agency will ensure that their caregivers are receiving regular training so they are always up to date on the best care practices. A good place to start is to find an agency that has earned top awards and noteworthy accolades, and then ask questions about their training plan and supervisory oversight to ensure quality.
Encore Caregivers has been awarded multiple distinctions for our incomparable care, including Best of Home Care’s Top 100 in Experience, Employer of Choice, and Provider of Choice Awards. We have been providing this exceptional care in our communities for years, and the families we work with can attest to the major difference working with a home care agency can make in an older loved one’s home care journey.
Get Started Today!
If you’re ready to work with a professional agency to get care for an aging adult you love, we can help! We have spent decades earning a reputation for professional, reliable care in our area. We work with only the most qualified caregivers in our community, and we make sure they receive the training and support they need to provide care you can trust, eliminating the administrative burden and risks that private contracts place on families.
To get started with our home care services , contact us online , or call us at 713-686-2233 for more information about how we can help in Memorial, Katy, Bellaire, Houston, and the surrounding areas.
