Interventions to Reduce the Impact of Client Death on Home Care Aides: Employers’ Perspectives

Emma K. Tsui, Emily Franzosa, Jennifer M. Reckrey, Marita LaMonica, Verena R. Cimarolli, Kathrin Boerner

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

5 Scopus citations

Abstract

For home care agencies and aides, the death of clients has important, yet often unrecognized, workforce implications. While research demonstrates that client death can cause grief and job insecurity for aides, we currently lack home care agencies’ perspectives on this issue and approaches to addressing it. This study uses key informant interviews with leaders from a diverse sample of eight New York City home care agencies to explore facilitators and barriers to agency action. We found that agencies engaged primarily in a range of informal, reactive practices related to client death, and relatively few targeted and proactive efforts to support aides around client death. While leaders generally acknowledged a need for greater aide support, they pointed to a lack of sustainable home care financing and policy resources to fund this. We recommend increased funding to support wages, paid time off, and supportive services, and discuss implications for future research.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)332-340
Number of pages9
JournalJournal of Applied Gerontology
Volume41
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Feb 2022

Keywords

  • end of life
  • home care
  • qualitative methods
  • stress
  • workforce

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