Home Assist Health

Oct. 9, 2014

Transcript:

José Cárdenas: Home assist health is a nonprofit providing in-home and nonmedical care for those living with the challenges of aging in Maricopa County. Here to talk about this is Sara Wilson, executive director and CEO of home assist health. Welcome.

Sara Wilson: Thank you for having me.
José Cárdenas: Home assist health is a new organization, but in many respects you've been around for a number of years.

Sara Wilson: Yes. We have actually been in Maricopa County for more than 15 years. We were operating as complete comfort care out of Maricopa integrated health systems, and it was a two-year process that we just looked at what our program was doing, and how we could reach a greater population. Not just in Maricopa County, but throughout the state of Arizona. It also allowed us the opportunity to be more diverse in the services we were doing. What we've been doing is a lot of long-term care, Medicaid services. We now have the opportunity to do more specialized programs that meet and respond to individual needs and today there is a huge growth, not only with those who are Latino population, but those who are hitting the retirement age of 55 and plus. And that has a significant impact on our health care system. So what we're trying to do is to offer a personalized program where our experts meet with the families and individuals on a one-on-one basis, to identify what your nonmedical care needs are, and how can we reduce the need for higher cost medical needs, how can we mitigate and prevent things from worsening, and how can we prolong the longevity of individuals staying in their homes.

José Cárdenas: So how do people get in touch with your organization so that this whole process can begin?

Sara Wilson: They going to our website at homeassisthealth.org. We have a marketing outreach manager who is available. Pretty much 24/7, any time somebody thinks they might have a need or just want to find out more about what we offer or what resources we can put them in touch with.

José Cárdenas: You talked about specialized programs. Can you give us a few examples of what those might be?

Sara Wilson: It could be anything from daily tasks, personal hygiene, errands, going with doctors' appointments, providing a relief to primary caregivers, we even can do things like daily activities, or shopping, coming up with outings, if somebody wanted to do a weekend getaway, we can offer those services as well.

José Cárdenas: And is there a certain level of need, in other words, dot people have to be limited in their mobility, or are your services available for somebody who is fairly robust and active in their mid 60s --

Sara Wilson: no limitations. Basically what we're looking to do is if you have something that you cannot fulfill on your own, and you need somebody to provide an extra set of hands to do it, we'll do that for you. If you don't yet qualify for specific benefits, then maybe we can help you with the interim. It's the kind --

José Cárdenas: is this covered by insurance?

Sara Wilson: It possibly could be. We would have our marketing relations specialist who would meet with you and look at what your funding options would be.

José Cárdenas: Are the needs for the Hispanic community greater or the same as it is for the community at large?

Sara Wilson: What's fascinating about this population that we're -- The Latino population is the strong sense of family. And keeping the family intact and at home. And reducing the need to have to go into a more institutionalized setting faster. So by providing those nonmedical home-based services, you get to stay home, the family unit stays together, and a lot of times we find the caregiver is the family. So we can be there to provide the supports to help keep that unit together longer.

José Cárdenas: Does that mean, though, that for those same reasons that Latino families more traditional are hesitant to engage your services?

Sara Wilson: They're hesitant, I don't think they're hesitant, I think they're undereducated in our service and what we can do. I think there's not enough Spanish speaking and buy lingual options once you get into the health care system and sometimes you don't have the support you need to navigate throughout the program and coordination of care. We do have a strong team of Spanish speaking first language and second language within our office, as well as throughout our pool of caregivers.

José Cárdenas: So you just got started, but as we point out you've been around for a while. It's a great organization, and we wish you the best.

Sara Wilson: Thank you.

José Cárdenas: Thank you for joining us on "Horizonte" to talk about it.

Sara Wilson: Thank you.

José Cárdenas: That is our show for tonight. From all of us here at "Horizonte" and eight, thank you for watching. I'm José Cárdenas. Have a good evening. 13:39:58:12 Captioning Performed By LNS Captioning www.LNScaptioning.com 13:39:59:24

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