When we reach a certain age, there comes a time in every human’s life when the body simply cannot perform basic physical activities as efficiently as it used to.
This can be extremely frustrating and even depressing at times, as we struggle to keep up with the same level of physical activity that was once second nature. Also, we deal with a sinking feeling that we are becoming a hassle to those around us.
This natural part of life comes from having acquired so many experiences. Relying on more physically-able family members to help us navigate our day to day lives starts to become more complex and even dangerous.
And although it is something where shame should not be felt, and it is essential to recognize the beauty of having our loved ones look after us in the ways we looked after our own elders when we were younger, there are better alternatives.
Licensed medical professionals and health care nurses are ready to provide home health care services: wound care, personal care, medication reminders, pain management, meal preparation, and more, depending on the agency or individuals you hire. Keep reading to learn what this is about!
Home Health Care Services
An agency that offers home care can provide experienced and knowledgeable staff members. This will help you live your life with less stress as this person will always take care of you, allowing you to be calm without any worry concerning your safety or that of your loved ones.
However, life has so many moving parts that, against their strongest desires, the people we love cannot cover every facet of the home health services we might need.
Reasons To Hire Home Health Care Services
Be it because of busy work schedules, other family obligations, or long distances, there are instances where family members don’t have all the needed tools to provide impaired adults with the medical care they need.
In these instances, it’s incredibly important that the person with a disability can receive the help they need from professionals. Fortunately for them, there are many options in place today that can ease the weight on family members’ shoulders.
Giving a disabled loved one someone who can care for their own personal care needs will ensure you can focus on your day-to-day more freely while ensuring they are in good hands. A simple way to create this is by hiring a personal caregiver.
When navigating the available options, if you are wondering what a personal caregiver can be, for what might be the most suitable home care alternative, or what they can do to help you and your loved ones, we will encounter the terms Home Care and Home Health Care used to signify possible home health aides.
Although they can be read as identical and synonymical at first glance, key differences can help us determine which is the most appropriate to our needs.
Home Care: Take The Weight Off Your Shoulders
Most senior adults prefer to stay home rather than move to a skilled nursing facility. Still, because of all the factors we have already talked about, this can be impossible and even dangerous if proper help is not available when needed. Home health aides are people who can help with daily living activities.
This includes things like grooming, bathing and dressing, therapeutic speech exercises, and physical and occupational exercises. Meal planning and preparation can take a massive load out of everyone’s shoulders and is one of the activities a home health aide can perform.
Home health aides are often the unsung heroes of the healthcare world. Their services go far beyond just providing transportation; they can help with housekeeping, laundry, and a laundry list of other essential tasks that can be incredibly helpful when caring for an aging or disabled person.
It’s important to spread the word so that people understand how much invaluable assistance these professionals provide.
What Are Home Health Aides?
Home health aides are invaluable in helping older adults with activities of daily living such as bathing, dressing, and eating when physical capabilities have been compromised due to aging.
In addition, many home health service providers require these aides to complete certifications to be eligible for government-funded programs such as Medicaid.
With their specialized training and expertise, home health aides can make life much easier for those who cannot do the mundane tasks independently.
Even though home care assistants are not required to have formal healthcare qualifications, they provide invaluable services. They should be recognized as a distinct profession compared to Home Health Care Aides.
This is the main difference between them, which sets them apart, as they offer different levels of care and medical support.
Home Health Care: Medical Assistance at Home
Home Health Care Aides are registered skilled nursing professionals with specialized training to provide more comprehensive medical care to elderly patients.
They are skilled medical professionals capable of providing specialized treatments, wound care, personal care, medication reminders and management, and other medical support-related services that senior citizens need to maintain their quality of life.
Medical professionals increasingly rely on advanced AI-powered technology to assist them with various tasks, including medication administration via injection or IV, ordering laboratory tests, recommending dietary habits and therapeutic physical exercises, extracting blood samples, and more.
Home Health Care professionals’ critical expertise and timely response can make a massive difference in the successful treatment and recovery from physical injuries.
Benefits of Hiring Home Health Care
Their trained medical assessments provide the insight and direction nonmedical requires to ensure patients receive the best care to obtain full mobility and restore their quality of life.
Falls or excessive effort can be prevented with the help of a trained individual who can identify potential risk factors to safeguard the patient. This proactive approach can ultimately save lives, preventing dangerous or life-threatening situations from arising.
Furthermore, it’s important to note that it is also beneficial for reducing healthcare costs and improving the overall quality of care.
Degenerative diseases like Parkinson’s Syndrome, Alzheimer’s, or dementia are never to be taken lightly and should always be attended to with great care.
A Professional Healthcare Provider Is There To:
To supervise the development of the disease, make necessary recommendations for its treatment, and bring great peace of mind to the affected and their family. Knowing that the situation is being adequately managed is priceless.
With the proper medical care and support, many sufferers of these terrible diseases can go on to lead long, healthy lives. Unfortunately, not all of us are blessed with the experience or knowledge to be able to effectively help our dear family and friends cope with life-threatening diseases.
These situations can be challenging and stressful to manage, but with some understanding and patience, we can try our best to support our loved ones in any way possible.
Reaching out and connecting to someone better educated or experienced in offering assistance and guidance to the people we care about can often be the most significant and productive way of demonstrating our compassion for them and helping them through what can feel like a difficult personal journey.
But What Are the Top 3 Differences?
- One requires medical training, and the other one doesn’t.
Home Health Care is an industry that provides trained medical personnel with a new way of delivering care to patients. They are trained nurses and assisted living professionals equipped to handle many demanding situations and emergencies that a Home Care Aide is not.
Because of their specialized nature, it’s better to think about Home Health Care when we have someone with severe mobility impairments, deteriorating memory or other mental faculties, painful and long-term diseases, among other conditions where the best intentions are not enough to give our loved ones the care they deserve.
- One mainly helps with daily chores. The other is a medical professional.
A Home Care Aide will intimately interact with in-home care and get to know the person they care for. They help with mundane tasks that our elderly or impaired loved ones cannot handle alone. Making more effort than necessary in these daily tasks can cause injuries to people who should not be handling them alone.
- One needs to be prescribed; the other doesn’t.
To hire the services of a Home Health Care assistant, they have to be authorized by a doctor. On the other hand, a Home Care Aide can be contracted privately without the doctor’s intervention.
Home Care vs. Home Health Care?
Assisted Living or Home Health Services provide our loved ones with the necessary care. And even though this is a presential task that professional people perform right in the place with you, we have the pleasure of collaborating with many Home Health Care agencies by providing all the remote services they need, such as virtual receptionists, staffing coordinators, and more.
Suppose you own a business in the health industry and want excellent bilingual professionals to handle every problematic or monotone task for your company. In that case, Freelance Latin America provides you with the most significant database of Latin American professionals to help you.
You can look at our article How Medical Virtual Receptionists Help Home Care Agencies to learn more about this topic!
See more articles by Andrea Corona.
