What Does a Health Care Aide Do and Their Duties?

What does a Health Care Aide do? As the Canadian population ages, health care providers of all types are in high-demand to ensure sick and elderly members of society are well looked after by qualified professionals.

At Robertson, we offer a range of Health Care Diploma Programs to accommodate the interests of those looking for a rewarding and vitally important career within care work. And for prospective students intrigued by the unique challenges of home health care aide, consider investigating our Health Care Aide Diploma Program.

Here is a snapshot of the duties you will perform as a home care provider:

1. Support Families in the Development of a Care Plan

Every client has different needs and requires different levels of support from families and medical professionals. As a home health care aide, it will be your job to sit down with your clients and their loved ones and create a care plan that establishes their day-to-day needs, as well as your role within those needs.

2. Provide Valuable Companionship

Old age and illness can bring about extreme isolation as these members of society often lose the ability to commit to social engagements outside of their own home. Home health care aides can play an important role in providing valuable social time and conversation to their clients.

In Robertson’s Health Care Aide Diploma Program instructors extensively cover client communication techniques to empower students with the ability to establish meaningful relationships with the patients they care for.

3. Advocate for Patients

One of the many reasons you will find meaning from your career as a home health care aide is because of the important medical advocacy work you will conduct on behalf of your clients.

Often, your patients will have many points of contact within the medical system – various specialists, their family doctor, a pharmacist – and one role you may take on is the coordination of these different contact points to ensure appointments are being made, prescriptions are filled, and all parties are fully aware of the patient’s needs.

4. Provide Relief for Family Members

A loved one with complex medical needs can be very difficult for a family to manage. The time you spend with a patient will allow family members breaks from the often extensive care they’re providing for loved ones.

5. Help Administer Medications and Other Medical Duties

Often patients in need of home health care aide require a number of medications, and may also need support with various bandaging and wound care. Our Health Care Aide Diploma Program will provide you with training in these sorts of health care tasks.

6. Support with Various Household Duties

Among the many duties you will perform as a home health care aide is maintaining a clean and dignified space for your clients to live. When someone has mobility issues or cognitive impairments, it’s difficult to tend to regular household duties. You will serve as a vital resource for your clients by ensuring their homes are sanitary and pleasant places to spend time in.

7. Help with Personal Hygiene of Patients

Similar to ensuring your clients have a clean and dignified space to live, you will also be tasked with maintaining their hygiene needs. This will involve providing assistance with bathing, using the toilet, and other personal care tasks that can  be, at times, challenging for both you and your client.

In our Health Care Aide Diploma Program instructors discuss how to conduct these tasks while keeping patient dignity to-of-mind.

8. Assist with Meal Planning and Food Prep

 At Robertson, our Health Care Aide Diploma Program empowers students with the training needed to prepare meals for clients and map out their nutritional needs.

This is just one of the many reasons why studying health at our college will fully equip you for all of the tasks you will surely confront in your career as a home health care aide.

9. Support with Mobility Needs

While this point may seem straightforward, there are certain physical maneuvers that will support in assisting you with the mobility care of your patients.

For example, moving a client into a bathtub or on to a wheelchair from a bed requires a certain level of coordination, experience and technique and our Health Care Aide Diploma Program provides this unique training to its students.

10. Report and Monitor Patient’s Health

As a home health care aide, you will be an important resource for members of your patient’s family to learn about their loved one’s health status. Tracking and monitoring the time you spend with your clients will be a fundamental way to ensure you’re able to relay any events that take place during your visits.

Studying health at Robertson will provide you with the training to complete this important task.

Now that you’ve learned some of the top responsibilities performed by home health care aides, we hope you’re intrigued to look into a career in health.

Our goal at Robertson is to equip you with the training you need for the job you will love, even if that means receiving certification for training you’ve completed in a foreign country. Whatever your needs may be, we want to match you with a program that will fuel your passion for a meaningful career helping those in need of medical care.