GEOH’s Greatest Hits: Top Moments from Home Care Happy Hour!

say, if you would have asked me even two years ago, you'll be working in a program, running a statewide program within a home and hospice organization, I probably would have said not something in my wheelhouse.

I started getting interested in healthcare in my last position.

I worked for a community mental health center and did workforce programming to get people interested when they graduate from an undergrad degree or a graduate degree.

We also did a more entry level apprenticeship program for someone with a high school diploma, but I could see the value in workforce development in helping people find their passion and then hopefully make that their passion by applying for and getting hired into a role within our mental health center.

And that's why I was interested in coming here because it's a, uh, challenging type of environment.

Home care can be a very isolating environment for caregivers.

And so I think that there's a lot of opportunity with those challenges to do a lot of good.

And that's one of the messages that when we talk to agencies about getting enrolled in our program, almost half of all of the caregivers just in the state of Indiana are in a low-income household.

And so what we do at a basic level is connect them to community resources that they might need.

Everything from home energy assistance and utility payment assistance, rental assistance, mortgage payment assistance.

We even have everything from

Food

pantries that we're providing with individuals in case they're experiencing food insecurity.

We'll give them something locally to them, you know, make sure that they go in ready with all of the requirements that that specific food bank might have.

But we can also talk to people about basic things like I have a six week old child that I need to enroll in a daycare.

Where should I go? What daycare should I look at? One of the things that we did with child care support was partner with KinderCare.

They have locations all over the country, but also locations all over the state of Indiana.

Employees can schedule an

appointment

with a consultant, and we have consultants living all around the state and living in the areas that they serve.

And so while we are a little bit of an employee assistance program, we go a little bit of a step further in that you only have to talk to one person.

And one of the greatest pieces of feedback that we've received about our program is how when someone comes back a second or third time for an appointment, They don't have to relive their story to the person.

The person already knows their background, what their challenges are.

Again, that may not be something when you are experiencing some of these financial insecurities yourself.

It can be a real debilitating thing to talk about what you've gone through or what you're currently experiencing.