Tips for Home Health Nursing - page 4

Hi new grad here and have been offered a home health nursing job, caring for medically fragile children, am really looking forward to and your article has given me courage to go for it, I was a little nervous about going it alone but I feel better and like you stated "trying to be prepared for all scenarios"

I ran onto your post here and wanted to say "THANK YOU". As an older retired person, who just had major surgery, I needed help from home health care. The nurses who came to help me with daily care and wound care, during my healing time, I cant give you enough praise for the dedication and care they gave me. If all nurses were this caring and concerned about patient care and comfort the hospitals would not be getting so many complaints, Yes I know, it is very different in the hospitals and doctors offices. Yet an order can seem like a request if worded correctly, and not barked out.
So to all the home health care Nurse I say Thank you. You show concern for your patients well being. You work in some very adverse conditions and yet you still have a smile and a kind word for your patients.

I have an interview in a few weeks with a home health agency. They stated that I will be taking a critical thinking test (no math or meds). Can any of you recommend a book or even post anything you think might be on this test that I should be prepared for?

Thank you very much.

Thank you for this article. It's really very helpful and inspiring.

Just finished 6 months as an LPN in Home Health, I understand the holes in the floor and the cockroaches, but when do you draw the line for your own safety, when it comes to dog feces EVERY where and mold and filth so bad, you know your health is in danger, is there a rule of conduct for a an agency to refuse service due to filth alone? I want your honest answer. Thank you.

I have done home health, of all kinds, hospice, home to home nursing care only visits, (dressings, lab draws, foleys, etc) and shift work, where i was in a home for an entire shift. Sometimes for peds, sometimes adults. I've also been an HH admissions nurse (harder work, imo, getting everything set up for brand new pts)

Not nearly as much as the OP has, not at all, but, off/on through the years, i have done home health.
loved it! Getting to know a patient and their family well, is such a plus. Having time to really do the things you want to, awesome. Autonomy, wonderful. Being creative, is a must now and then, loved that part, too. Lots of great things about HH.
I have never ever felt afraid.

I've been afraid more than once in a hospital, with some of the patients i've interacted with there, oh my yes! Yes i have felt a lil wave of fear now and then over someone's behavior. and i once had a brain-damaged pt grab my head and twist my neck. Ouch! I've also witnessed many a coworker take a punch or slap from some demented pt here or there.
in a hospital.

but in a home care setting, nope, hasn't happened to me, anyway, that i was afraid of the patient or of their family, either.
I suppose, if i ever ever was justifiably afraid, i'd pull out my cell phone and dial 911 as i left the home, i guess, seems like that'd be what to do, but, never having experienced that, i don't know.


Different people have different comfort levels, i once had a coworker in ICU who was so so easily terrified, (i do mean terrified) all the time, over what seemed to me to be nothing. Lots of people scared her. but, i kind of think that was just something odd about her.