As a home health care provider, you have the best intentions in mind when it comes to your clients and their loved ones’ care.
Sadly, that isn’t always the case with every provider.
In a tragic news story, a man named Thomas from Dutchess County, NY shared he is suing a home health care company as well as his insurance company after his father, Henry, passed away as a result of mistreatment and abuse by the aides who cared for him in his home.
Henry had been struggling with dementia and began wandering the house in the early morning and late-night hours, leading Thomas to hire the aides and install surveillance cameras in his father’s living space.
The cameras were in plain sight, Thomas explained, and the aides were informed they were in place. Thomas did not check the recordings until he started noticing mysterious bruises on Henry, and once an X-ray was completed, he received a diagnosis of four fractured ribs. After speaking with his son, Thomas learned his father had fallen three days earlier, the aides helped him get back up, and they did not report the incident.
Troubled by this occurrence, Thomas decided to look at old footage caught by the cameras, and what he found was potentially even more disturbing. Click here to see the whole story.
Elder Abuse Doesn’t Stop with Physical Abuse
Physical elder abuse is defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as, “When an elder experiences illness, pain, injury, functional impairment, distress, or death as a result of the intentional use of physical force and includes acts such as hitting, kicking, pushing, slapping, and burning.”
Of course, physical abuse performed by a caregiver is unacceptable, but it isn’t the only type of mistreatment elders can experience at the hands of their home health aides. Here are some other categories of abuse that older adults can, unfortunately, become victims of:
- Emotional or Psychological Abuse - Behaving in a way that causes agony or mental pain, fear, or distress to an elderly person. Any type of isolation, disrespect, or humiliation, as well as verbal and non-verbal threats, is considered abuse.
- Sexual Abuse – Forcing any kind of unwanted sexual interaction with an older adult, including both sexual contact or non-contact acts like sexual harassment.
- Financial Abuse - Using an elderly person’s money, benefits or personal property, belongings, or assets in an illegal, unauthorized, or improper matter in the interest of someone other than the rightful owner.
- Neglect - Failing to meet an elder’s basic needs, such as food, water, shelter, clothing, hygiene, and required medical care.
You can help prevent these intolerable behaviors and their consequences when you have the best home health aides representing your home care agency. But how exactly can you do that? With Good Egg, it’s entirely possible.
Protect Your Clients & Your Company’s Reputation
You need to ensure you’re hiring experienced, good-minded home health aides, and your clients have a right to know their loved ones are being taken care of properly. Avoiding cases of elder abuse like the one we’ve covered, as well as the litigation and bad publicity that follows them, is easier when you start the hiring process with a trusted background screening company (like Good Egg) on your side.
If you want to build the best team of in-home caregivers who haven’t and won’t commit any of the above types of abuse, you need to run the right background screens, such as:
- Pre-employment background checks
Good Egg will check criminal records, professional references, education and professional licenses, level three FACIS, personal data, and social media for well-rounded screens of the individuals you’re considering. Knowing the true intentions of any home health aide can be tricky, but these screens will take the guesswork out of finding any past offenses they may have committed. - Post-employment background checks
Even after you’ve hired new aides, you want to make sure they’re upholding your company’s standards. Ongoing monitoring is the best way to do just that. Good Egg will monitor their criminal records, social media profiles, motor vehicle records (MVRs), and drug use (through random drug testing) while respecting your employees’ privacy. You’ll minimize client risk and promote a safer work environment by continuously keeping tabs on your home health aides. - Verifications
The sad truth is that applicants lie on their resumes. The good news is that Good Egg can debunk those fibs and show you the truth about your prospective home health aides. We’ll double-check their claims about the above pre-employment matters as well as their personal data to confirm you’re hiring individuals who can legally work for you.
Experience the Good Egg Difference
When you work with Good Egg, not only will you hire the right nurses and aides quickly, but you’ll also benefit from paperless, secure, and fully customizable screenings. We’ll make the process seamless from beginning to end so you can focus on finding more reputable caregivers to represent your company.
Get started with our comprehensive healthcare background check program today and see why so many customers have depended on Good Egg to hire better, safer employees.
