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REPORT: Mapping the Terrain of NYC’s Home Care Aide Training System

September 17, 2014

New York City’s sprawling, fragmented system for training home care aides is the focus of a report prepared by PHI New York Policy Director Carol Rodat for the New York City Council.

Training New York City Home Care Aides: A Landscape Survey” provides an overview of the many training programs for home health aides (HHAs) and personal care aides (PCAs, also known in New York City as “home attendants”).

Rodat takes a detailed look at the three different training options for home care aides:

  • training by an employer who is also a provider of home care services,
  • training in a community college or publicly supported school, and
  • training in a for-profit training program.

These different training settings, which are overseen by either the New York State Education Department or Department of Health, are then compared and contrasted in areas such as cost, attendance requirements, and hours spent undergoing “supervised practical training” in actual care settings.

The comprehensive report further examines other initiatives and projects related to New York’s home care workforce, including Medicaid Redesign, state demonstrations related to advanced roles for home care aides, and New York’s home care registry.

The report concludes with recommended steps the city could take to support quality home care training.

For example, the report recommends that the city formulate a set of questions potential trainees can use when evaluating a training program, fund and staff the state’s Home Care Registry, and develop a mechanism for rating the quality of the Home Health Aide Training Programs.

The report is the third in a series of studies of New York’s home care aide training “system,” which also includes “Preparing New York’s Home Care Aides for the 21st Century” (October 2010) and “Improving New York’s Home Care Aide Training System” (September 2013), which are available at the PHI New York home page.

The New York City Council requested and funded the report.

— by Matthew Ozga

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