For many who become ill or whose activities are restricted, there is no place like home, and keeping people safe and comfortable in their own familiar surroundings for as long as possible—at a lower cost—is the goal of the Hackley Visiting Nurse Services Private Care Division. It’s a goal they achieve every day.
   The private care division has been a fixture at HVNS since the 1980s, and Linda Scott has been the director since 1993. A 1976 graduate of the Hackley School of Nursing, Scott worked for 16 years as a medical/surgical nurse, pediatric nurse and in nursing management at Hackley Hospital before joining HVNS. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Ferris State University in 1988.
   Scott  supervises, trains and motivates a staff that includes a full-time scheduler, two registered nurses, 35 certified home health aides and 10 homemakers who care for people with chronic medical conditions, in their homes. “For the most part,” Scott explains, “our patients do not need daily nursing care, but they do need someone to be there for a few hours a day, one or more days a week, to prepare a meal, give a bath, check blood pressure and do light housework.”
   A Registered Nurse visits the patient to perform an initial assessment and set up a plan of care. A certified home health aide or homemaker is then assigned to visit, usually for two to three hours but often for as many as eight, two to four times a week. For those who wish it, however, care is available seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day.
“Our certified home health aides are trained to recognize any change in a patient’s condition and to communicate regularly with the nursing staff so that a nurse can determine when the next level of care might be needed,” adds Scott. A lot of the clients pay for the home health aide or homemaker services privately. Some of them have long-term care insurance which may cover the cost of personal care, and some clients have the care paid for by agencies such as Senior Resources of Muskegon or Health and Human Services in Grand Rapids. “These agencies frequently contract with us to provide services,” explains Scott, adding that the relatively low cost of private care services can save patients, their families, and taxpayers many thousands of dollars by delaying admission to a nursing home. In some instances, auto insurance companies will contract with HVNS for private care for patients injured in auto accidents.
   While the majority of patients are elderly, younger patients are also seen, including children and pregnant women who have been ordered to bed rest. Scott states that recently they have seen an increase in the number of homemaker/companion services, which is even more affordable than the aide services.
“Even when insurance coverage is not available,” Scott advises, “private care is much more affordable than people might think.” For example, in a two-hour visit, which costs about $35, a certified home health aide can give a bath, make a meal and perform some simple household chores such as vacuuming and cleaning a bathroom. More importantly, perhaps, is the companionship provided and the “eyes and ears” of a skilled caregiver on the scene.
“HVNS private care is comparable in cost to a private housekeeping service, and yet our services are provided by trained and certified home health aides who are supervised by registered nurses and backed up by the 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week availability of the VNS,” says Scott. “And at no extra charge we provide peace of mind for patients and their families.”
The private care staff of HVNS also services the Hospice respite program, which provides certified home health aides in the home to “give a break” to the patient’s primary caregiver, often a relative or friend who would get little rest or time for him or herself if not for this service. Another vitally important service provided by Scott and her staff are the annual flu clinics throughout Muskegon, Oceana and northern Ottawa counties. Scott hires as many as 30 additional nurses during the fall months, who give a total of 10,000 flu shots at supermarkets, schools, churches and public health departments in communities from Ludington in the north to Grand Haven in the south. Scott does not expect last year’s flu serum shortages to be repeated.
Despite the many and varied challenges of her job, Linda Scott still enjoys what she does. “I’m a people person, and training and motivating people to care for other people in their homes is a very rewarding job,” she concludes.