switching from Nursing home to home health

macrich84 · Mar 25, 2009

I have experience in both LTC and home health. Currently, I am working in hh. You can get grumpy clients just like you can get grumpy residents. Sometimes grump and attitudes come with the territory if you are working with people that may have dementia. However, you just have to learn to ignore it. As far as the cleaning.. yes.. you do some cleaning. It amounts to maybe 20 percent of what you do while you're with the clients. I generally do a load of laundry, clean up the bathrooms and kitchen. It really isn't too bad. During a day, I do basically what is done in a LTC facility. BUT, it is with one client or in my case two. You are able to devote a lot more time to your clients. I make meals, assist with ADLS, hygiene, transferring, ambulating. You might have to take a client to a doctors appointment or take them grocery shopping. I really enjoy working with my clients. You might not necessarily take a pay cut either. Take a look around the area at all of the different home health care agencies and see who offers you the best pay along with hours.

If you have any other questions feel free to ask. I hope this helps.

wwhispers · Jun 4, 2009

I have worked Home Health for my 3 years as a CNA. I made it through 3 days of a 5 day orientation at a LTF. I couldn't handle it. HH is much more personal and relaxed. Yes you do light house work, it's not really bad. I had a client for over a year that went to the beach daily(nice), went to shows, movies. She paid for my YMCA membership. I took classes with her. She was a great client. I was more of a companion then a CNA. I have also taken care of a total care 18 yr old CP patient. I was with him for 8 months. As you see, the range of clients vary. After the back breaker I had(very sweet though) I had yesterday, I'm thinking of going back to my last client, they offered to buy out my no compete. If you like to talk and listen to clients, you should enjoy HH more.

walkingon, CNA, LPN · Jun 4, 2009

I worked in hh before I went into long-term. Loved my clients, but my car wasn't loving all the running for my job then to go to school in the evenings (plus our mileage reimbursement wasn't the greatest). My experience was different than macrich84 in that housework was a much higher percentage of my job. It was a rare client indeed that required only personal care and no housework.

Grumpy clients? Really, most of them weren't, but even the grumpy ones couldn't resist my charm and warmed up after a few visits. Some did try to give me $ and gifts, but we understandably weren't allowed to accept, and I didn't.

You'll have to find out about how your agency assigns shifts, too....ours worked like this. Travel to client #1 at 8 a.m., work 2 hours, travel to client 2 on the other side of town, work 3 hours, maybe to client 3 in another city close by for a couple hours, then travel home. You can easily eat up 8 hours for 5 or 6 hours of paid work when you count travel time. If you were really lucky, there'd be an 8 hour shift at one client's home. Some days there was only one 2-hour shift, some days nothing, some days the sitter would be lined up and the client would cancel.

A girl at the LTCF where I work now is moonlighting as a private aide for a former resident and she loves it; says it's easy $. To me, those are the best gigs if you can get them. LTC works much better for me, though, because travel isn't an issue, the hours are much more reliable and I'm getting way better hands-on experience for nursing school. If you're pregnant, either one is going to be hard work, home health probably less so than long-term. You could always try it for awhile and look for something else if it isn't a good fit for you. Good luck!