How to stay at home and get medical care? What is a home care service? How to access Home Health Care?

This service allows sick or dependent people to stay at home. It also facilitates a return home after hospitalization.

Home Nursing Services

Care is provided by Home Nursing Services. Sometimes managed by public institutions (hospitals, retirement homes …), these services are most often administered by associations.

Home help

Attention: SSIADs often come to supplement a home help (help with the reading of the mail, the household, the walk, the accompaniment of the races …), but they do not replace it under any circumstances.

Who is involved in the home care service?

This care is for people over 60, but can start earlier in case of disability. It is often after an illness or a fall that a person receives care at home.

If you want care at home, you need:

– that your illness requires medical supervision;

– that your state does not require hospitalization;

– that there is a home care service in your municipality.

Where to search

Home care services are growing, but it is not always easy to find the addresses and know what steps to take.

– It is best to seek advice from your doctor.

– You also have the possibility of going to find a social worker, at the hospital, in your company …

– Also remember to inquire with your town hall. Some services can provide you with valuable information, such as the community center for social action …

Your town hall can also put you in contact with Local Information and Coordination Center. Funded in part by the General Council, this local structure is developing in France and teems with contacts. She will refer you to the Senior Home Care in your area.

How to apply for home care services?

These home care services are on medical prescription. Your doctor explains the nature, duration and rhythm of visits and interventions in your home. The prescription can be renewed as many times as necessary.

How does it work and what care is provided?

Nurses and caregivers go to your home (sometimes several times a day), to help you with daily activities and to provide you with the care you need.

For what types of care?

The care is varied. This may include:
– medical supervision;
– nursing gestures (injections, bandages …);
– assistance with personal hygiene care (help with the toilet, prevention of pressure ulcers …);
– paramedical care (physiotherapist …).

What role for loved ones?

Of course, the intervention of a home care service is only possible if the sick person expresses the wish. However, for this system of care to be of maximum help, the family must take an active part in this care.

How much does the home care service cost?

The costs are entirely covered by the National Health Insurance Fund.

The latter pays a fixed daily allowance covering all the expenses of the service, as well as the remuneration of the staff and the running costs (premises, transport …).

Advantages and disadvantages of home care service

“Being able to receive care at home is really valuable for the patient,” says Jerome Albisseti, Senior Pharmacist at Air Liquid Sant, “he can stay in his furniture and benefit from a much better care environment.”

Such care offers people (who often live alone) a human touch, a strong emotional relationship. “They are at home and not in an anonymous and cold structure, like the hospital,” says Dr. Breuille.

Above all, home care avoids uprooting the person.

“In fact, it often happens that a person who lives alone at home comes back disturbed after hospitalization,” continues Dr. Breuille.

She becomes depressed, no longer eats and has behavioral problems. Home care services prevent this kind of disorder. ”

The inconvenient

People cared for by this care system often express the difficulty of coping with their anxieties once caregivers leave home and find themselves alone at home.

“I’m scared, especially at night,” says 85-year-old Georges, who is being followed at home in the treatment of his Alzheimer’s disease, “I’m afraid of losing my head and doing something stupid, like leaving my house, or to fall…”

It is then necessary to know how to be helped: the personalized allowance of autonomy can, for example, allow you to pay a nurse or a night watchman.