Clinical Geriatrics

When the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released Retooling for an Aging America: Building the Health Care Workforce last spring, the report got considerable attention—and for good reason. The IOM report spelled out the problem at hand clearly and concisely: The nation’s healthcare workforce is too small and is unprepared to care for the rapidly growing number of older Americans. The media took note.

In the months since, we’ve been reading headlines about other growing crises: the deepening economic downturn; ballooning deficits; and record jumps in unemployment. In the midst of all these crises, there’s a chance that the pressing need to prepare the workforce for the coming Age Boom will get overlooked.

It shouldn’t. Addressing economic crises need not mean deferring efforts to address other crises—including the eldercare workforce crisis. In fact, focusing on the latter can help with the former. Just ask Nancy Lundebjerg, MPA, Deputy Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of the AGS and co-convener—with Steven Dawson of PHI, a national nonprofit working to improve the quality of eldercare and disability services by supporting quality jobs for direct-care workers—of the newly established Eldercare Workforce Alliance (EWA; www.eldercareworkforce.org/).

“EWA’s goal is to develop practical solutions that will build a caring and competent eldercare workforce providing high-quality, culturally sensitive, person-directed, family-focused care that improves the quality of life of America’s elders,” says Ms. Lundebjerg. These solutions, she points out, can also create much-needed jobs. “Eldercare is projected to be the fastest-growing employment sector in the healthcare industry,” she notes.

EWA, established in direct response to the IOM report, includes 25 member organizations representing older adults and the healthcare professionals, direct-care workers, and family members who care for them. Alice H. Hedt, previously the Executive Director of NCCNHR: The National Consumer Voice for Quality Long-Term Care, is the EWA’s Project Director. The work of the Alliance is supported by grants from The Atlantic Philanthropies and the John A. Hartford Foundation.

In response to the eldercare workforce crisis, the Alliance is working to:

• Strengthen the direct-care workforce through better training, supervision, and improved compensation;
• Address clinician and faculty shortages, through incentives such as loan forgiveness, increased public funding for training, and better compensation;
• Ensure a competent workforce by encouraging agencies and organizations that certify and regulate the eldercare workforce to require demonstrated and continued competence; and
• Redesign healthcare delivery by adopting cost-effective care coordination models.

Accomplishing these goals is absolutely essential to ensuring that we will have enough well-trained eldercare providers to meet the growing need. As many of us know all too well, we won’t attract, train, and retain healthcare professionals without ensuring adequate compensation—an overhaul of the inadequate Medicare payment system is a must—and providing educational opportunities. To address shortages and high turnover in direct care, we need to boost compensation in those fields and provide adequate training as well.

Among other things, the EWA has the potential to significantly raise awareness of eldercare issues with the public and the media and within the healthcare industry, and to help advance appropriate public policy.

The importance of public policy outreach and advocacy can’t be overestimated. Consider the “Retooling the Health Care Workforce for an Aging America Act,” introduced in both the Senate and the House in January.