8 JUNE 2025ELDERCARE REVIEWBy Elsa Lam, Vice President, Regional Patient Care Services, VNS HealthWHAT IT TAKES TO BE A HOME HEALTH CARE WORKERHome care nursing is one of the fastest-growing areas of the nursing profession. As U.S. healthcare increasingly focuses on driving down costs and avoiding expensive inpatient care, attending to whole-person care across the continuum and delivering long-term care in the community for an aging population living with chronic illnesses--as home care nurses do--is now a national priority.At the same time, being a home health care clinician involves unique challenges. Keeping patients safe and healthy at home demands creativity, collaboration, active listening, and cultural sensitivity. Home care workers use every bit of their clinical knowledge--and then some. Home care workers are also teachers--educating and empowering patients and their family caregivers on the patient's condition, including symptoms and prognosis, and recommending lifestyle changes for better health. They are detectives and explorers, seeking clues to health and safety around the house, from fall hazards and the supply of food in the refrigerator to unopened bottles of medicines. They are ambassadors and translators, bringing their cultural and linguistic knowledge into each home they visit and being willing to learn from other cultures. They are also allies and advocates for people in their care, especially those living on the margins. As home care clinicians strive to keep patients active, engaged, and willing to embrace the plan of care, they can also be entertainers, dancers and singers, and even stand-up comedians. And in times of crisis, they are often first responders, the first ones to bring compassion and care to vulnerable people isolated by a public health emergency. For those living at the margins and may be unhoused, we also serve as community outreach workers, treating them wherever they happen. For instance, Behavioral Health Nurse Rebecca Miller-Martinez might meet her patients in the subway, on a park bench, or in a shelter--wherever they need help. "We are the marines of behavioral health," she says. The same could be said for many branches of home care. Judging by my colleagues at VNS Health, we are strong and on the frontlines of health care, where teamwork is everything and changing the world is in our hands. So, what does it take to be a home healthcare worker? The short answer is Someone who combines the best qualities of a full range of professions as they advance compassionate care in the home.Educating and Empowering (Teacher)"Nurses are teachers," says Ruth Caballero, RN, explaining how she works with a typical patient who has uncontrolled diabetes. Ruth provides clinical care and education about daily glucose testing, nutrition, and lifestyle changes that can help the patient lower their dangerously elevated blood sugar to normal ranges. Home care nurse Nicole Casiano loves to hear her patients say, "No one ever told me that before." She heard those words recently from a woman with heart failure and
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