I just returned from Gurnee, Illinois, where my leadership team and I spent a week of training preparing to open BrightStar of Grosse Pointe / Southeast Macomb. With me were Susan Miruzzi, Director of Operations; Bobbie Soeder, Director of Sales; and Sandra Hardy, RN and Director of Nursing. Each brings a long and successful career to her respective position. I’m blessed to have found them and am eager to introduce them to you in upcoming columns.
But as I sat in the classroom studying our advanced office IT system and reviewing winning sales strategies, I kept thinking about the most important staff members of my new organization – the caregivers.
Two weeks ago, my team and I held a job fair for caregivers and nurses at our St. Clair Shores office. More than 130 applicants came through our doors, many with years of experience caring for family members or neighborhood friends. Others had just completed Certified Nursing Assistant programs at Dorsey Schools or Macomb Community College.
The process for hiring caregivers at BrightStar is arduous, as it should be. It’s designed to help us find the right employees to fill these special jobs. We require on-line and in-the-field testing as well as background checks and drug testing. Lengthy interviews are followed by lengthy orientation. Once hired, our caregivers will keep current with in-service training from experts in gerontology.
None of this should surprise you. All home care agencies should design such rigor into their hiring practices. And many do. But what sets BrightStar apart from so many other agencies is what we call “RN oversight” and “Guaranteed Compatibility.”
Each and every home my BrightStar agency is invited into will be reviewed by Sandra Hardy, a Registered Nurse in the Detroit area for more than 30 years and an expert in critical care. After assessing the client and his or her environment, visiting with the family and conferring with the physician where necessary, Sandra will write a “plan of care” for the client.
The caregiver will follow that plan to ensure the client is receiving everything he or she needs – and more. The plan could include a social event such as a walk around the block or a medical treatment requiring Sandra or one of her LPNs – and everything in between.
But before we assign that caregiver, we’ll consider the client’s interests, personality and health – because we guarantee compatibility. If we get it wrong, we’ll make a change. No questions asked. And we won’t wait for the client to ask. By then, it’s too late.
A few months ago, my sisters and I fired one agency and hired another to care for our mother. Mom had told us she was simply “tolerating” the women caring for her, and we made the change. It was one more step in an already difficult process. Everything about getting care for your parents is hard. Coming to the realization that it’s needed. Figuring out who pays. Making the decision to finally do it. And interviewing various agencies.
Inviting someone into your mother’s home to help get her washed and dressed, to make her breakfast, to keep her company – when you can’t be there – is one of the most emotional decisions a family will ever make. As I prepare to open my new business, I know balancing the books and planning the sales calls are important. But what keeps playing over in my mind is how the day unfolds in your mother’s home. I see a caregiver, concerned and kind, understanding intrinsically that though the calendar says chair yoga at 11 a.m. the senior center, your mother would rather stay home and pick flowers in the garden.
I hope this gives you, the daughter or son, the peace of mind you so badly need and deserve.
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