N C H S - National Home and Hospice Care Survey - Home Health Definitions of Terms

About 6,000 eight home health aides from all the agencies participating in the National Home and Hospice Care Survey (NHHCS) will be selected to take part in a new national survey of home health aides. The National Home Health Aide Survey (NHHAS) will help the home health and hospice industry develop more effective ways to recruit, train, and retain home health aides.

What is the National Home Health Aide Survey?
The National Home Health Aide Survey (NHHAS) is the first national study of home health aides working in home health and hospice agencies in the United States. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is sponsoring the study. About 6,000 home health aides will be chosen for the NHHAS from about 1,500 home health and hospice agencies across the country. The NHHAS will look at the important role of home health aides in providing long-term care services for the growing elderly and chronically ill population.

The NHHAS, part of the National Home and Hospice Care Survey, will provide new information needed to recruit, retain, and expand the workforce who provides the direct care to home health and hospice patients. We will conduct this first national survey of home health aides as a telephone interview with a sample of workers who provide home health and hospice patients with assistance in activities of daily living (ADLs) (eating, transferring, toileting, dressing and bathing). The survey includes collecting information on whether workers plan to continue working in their present positions and what factors affect their decisions, including job satisfaction, nature of the work environment, training, advancement opportunities, benefits, working conditions, and personal or family demands. The survey will help identify home health aides’ priorities, ways to meet those priorities, and how to prevent staffing shortages in the future.

Why should I participate?
Our Nation is facing a major shortage of home health aides who provide for the long-term care needs of patients living at home and patients receiving hospice care. As “baby boomers” age, the need for long-term care will increase. The need for home health aides will also grow. But today, many home health aides are leaving and too few are entering the field.

We need to find out from home health aides about their work experiences and the challenges they face. This information will guide changes in policy and practice that can help attract new people to become home health aides. Without the voice of home health aides to help inform public policy and new programs, it is likely the shortage of home health aides will increase.

Therefore, your participation in the National Home Health Aide Survey is important; without your involvement, home health aides like you will not be included in the national description of home health aides who work in U.S. home health and hospice agencies.

Home health aides like you provide care to more than 2.2 million elderly and chronically ill people who receive care from approximately 10,000 home health and hospice agencies across the United States. We need to keep experienced, dedicated home health aides in the field and find new ways to attract more home health aides for the future.

Some of the important goals of the NHHAS are to provide a better understanding of:

Paraprofessional Healthcare Institute
National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization
National Association for Home Care

How was I selected?
Home health aides are selected from about 1,500 home health and hospice agencies participating in the National Home and Hospice Care Survey. About 6,000 home health aides will be chosen throughout the United States for this survey. Home health aides are randomly selected from a list of all home health aides employed by the home health and hospice agencies participating in the NHHAS. A sample of home health aides are selected from each agency. The home health aides selected from your agency represent your agency as well as other agencies of similar size in your geographic region.

Your participation makes the data more accurate. Your participation helps researchers, policy makers, and the home health and hospice industry understand the concerns of home health aides. Failure to participate in the survey lessens the accuracy of the information collected.

How do I know that the NHHAS is a real survey?
The National Home and Hospice Care Survey (NHHCS) has been in existence since 1992 with periodic national surveys conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics since that time. The NHHCS was developed in response to the rapid growth in the number of home health and hospice agencies throughout the United States. This growth led to a need for information on the availability and utilization of services offered by these agencies. The goal of the first survey was to evaluate the health status and services provided to patients and to find out whether there were enough agencies and staff to care for these patients. Today, home health and hospice agencies continue to provide much needed patient services to a large segment of the country’s disabled, ill, and elderly population. As the nation’s total population of older adults grows and the average lifespan continues to increase, we need to continue to assess the availability and adequacy of these services.

You can call this toll-free number, 1-888-290-1125, for more information about the National Home Health Aide Survey.

Is my information kept confidential?
The identity of all survey participants is kept strictly confidential. All information collected in this survey will be held in strict confidence according to law {section 308 (d) of the Public Service Act (42 United States Code 242m)}. By law, information that would identify you to anyone not connected with the survey cannot be released.

All information collected in this survey will be kept private, including your name and the agency where you work. No information will be given to your supervisor or agency. And your job or certification will not be affected.

We assign code numbers in place of names or other facts that could identify you. None of your answers will be reported in any way that identifies you personally. The survey results will only be released in summary tables and reports. No information collected in this survey may be used for any other purpose than the purpose for which it was collected. If any federal employee or contractor gives out confidential information not authorized by law, he or she can be fired and fined and/or imprisoned.

What is involved in participating?
After you are selected to participate in the survey, you will receive a package of information from the agency where you work. The package contains information about the survey and a token of appreciation for taking time to learn about the survey. To participate in the survey, please fill in your name and contact information on the postcard and mail it to us in the postage paid envelope or call the toll free number on the postcard to schedule a convenient time to participate in the survey.

After you contact us, an interviewer will call you to conduct the telephone interview. A survey representative will also attempt to call you for the interview, should we not hear from you. The interview will be scheduled during nonworking hours, at a time that is convenient for you.

The interview will take about 40 minutes and will include questions about your:

Training

Job history

Supervision

Wages and benefits

Other work-related issues

Would you prefer to work more or fewer hours on this job, or is the amount of hours you work about right?

After completing the interview, you will receive $30 in appreciation for participating in this important survey.

Who can I contact if I have additional questions?
To discuss any part of the National Home Health Aide Survey or to learn more about it, you can call this toll-free number, 1-888-290-1125. You can also ask to speak with representatives from the Federal agencies that sponsor this survey at (301) 458-4747.