Home care experts from regional and national perspectives have identified the following top three (3) challenges facing them today.
Increasing Costs & Limited Funding
Home care programs are challenged with managing increasing costs while maintaining service levels within fixed funding allocations. In most provinces, per capita spending on home care is well below that of residential care facilities or hospitals. The factors contributing to the escalation of home care costs include a progressively aging population who use more health services, rising consumer expectations for services in their homes, increased client acuity, health care reform, staff expenses, plus the growing demand for technology and equipment.
Access
Increasing demand, geographic dispersion and lack of consistency in scope of services within regions across the country affects access to home care services. In a 2003 survey 35% of Canadians expressed dissatisfaction with access to home and community care.
Human Resources
Recruitment and retention of trained staff is a constant challenge for all home care programs across
Informal / family caregivers are facing increasing demands to participate in care and often experience burnout that results in a lack of support for those in need. It is estimated that close to 3 million Canadians provided care to someone in the home with a chronic disease or disability. The top three (3) needs identified by informal / family caregivers to support them included: information on community services for care recipients (43%), information, advice or training on how to provide care (33%), and respite care (31%).
