We Care Online's December Tuition Reimbursement Winner

M. Torres-Hernandez

It's a great end to 2013 for M. Torres-Hernandez! She is the lucky winner of We Care Online's CNA Tuition Reimbursement drawing for December. She'll be getting a check from us soon.  You could be next!

Students registered for a Nurse Aide course will automatically be placed in a monthly drawing to win reimbursement of their course tuition. The monthly drawings will choose one student in Kansas and one student in South Dakota to win a reimbursement.

If you want to know how to get in on this Click Here for more information.
Or go to our website Click Here.

Remember, before you can win, you have to register for a Nurse Aide course - See our course catalog Click Here.

Interviewing for that Healthcare Position? Be Ready.

Regardless of your experience or credentials, it’s important to prepare for the interview when applying for a job in the healthcare industry. Whether conducted in person or on the phone, the interview provides an ideal opportunity to present your qualifications, show how you can make a contribution, and learn more about the immediate position and the organization itself.


Being ready for an interview when the opportunity presents itself, might be one of the most vital and crucial moments of your professional life. But you will need to do some homework in order to accomplish those interview goals. The first step is to review your experience, education and training to see which elements might be most important to a recruiter. And since the interviewer will have already seen your resume, you should be prepared to expand on the key points.

Let’s start with the basics “tell us about yourself” this is one of the simplest and greatest opportunities for you to break the ice and show what you are all about. Usually this question is given to you.

For More and the Original Blog.

Learn what it takes to become a certified nurse assistant.

Marketers Zero in on Adult Child in Senior Living Sales

Senior living marketers are zeroing in on prospects’ children as a strategy to counteract delayed transitions into senior housing communities, noting a correlation between adult child involvement and quicker move-ins.

“Adult children getting more and more involved than they ever have at the residential level,” said Krista DiGeorge, regional marketing director at Asbury, a not-for-profit senior living organization, during a session at the 2013 LeadingAge Annual Meeting and Expo. “They’re realizing the impact on them to have Mom and Dad at home.”

With many seniors delaying a move, more adult children are serving as caregivers, Cathy Ritter, vice president of Marketing and Communications at Asbury, said during the session. But many of those adult children are in the “sandwich generation”—caring for elderly parents while still raising their own family—and they’re concerned about their parents’ safety.

For More and the Original Article.

Facilities: Now you can post your job openings here! Use WeCareOnline's Forum to reach our present and past students.

5 Ways You May be Unintentionally Holding Back Your Career

Ever feel like you must have accidentally skipped that class on how to navigate and grow your career? 
You wonder who really need to know that will either give you the right guidance, insights or referrals.  You want to be seen for your true capabilities, but can’t seem to figure out how.  You have at least one co-worker who is constantly critical and makes you tense.
Problem is, you didn’t skip any class.  It didn’t exist!

So you forged through these challenges, making mistakes, missteps, and having downright painful experiences.  You’ve made some progress but you still don’t feel confident handling situations and how to truly put yourself in the driver’s seat of your career.

For More and the Original Blog.

Like to learn what it takes to be a restorative aide?

Home Health Job Market Dominates Services

More than half of the approximately 8.4 million Americans who receive paid long-term care were using home health services, according to a first-of-its-kind report on senior care services and users.

The nation’s 12,200 home health agencies served about 4.7 million patients in 2011, the latest year when data was available, says the National Study of Long-Term Care Providers, conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics.

The report collected data from around 58,500 paid, regulated long-term care services providers in 2012 split into five categories—nursing homes, assisted living communities, home health agencies, hospice agencies, and adult day services centers—and includes information on provider capacity, staffing level, and services provided, along with a national profile of long-term care users.

More than 8 million Americans received services from 4,800 adult day services centers, 12,200 home health agencies, 3,700 hospices, 15,700 nursing homes, and 22,200 assisted living and residential care communities.

Of those, home health agencies served the largest population, followed by nursing homes with nearly 1.4 million residents and the more than 1.2 million patients who received hospice services.

For More and the Original Article.

Like to learn more about becoming a home health aide?

How to Make a Glove Christmas Tree

Nurses and nurse aides are creative individuals. You have to be to do the job. There’s no nurse around that hasn’t had to get creative to dress a wound properly, manage time effectively, or appease a seemingly inconsolable patient. Creativity is just the name of the game in nursing. Unfortunately, working holidays is also a big part of the nursing game. One holiday that many nurses find particularly difficult to work is on Christmas. So many nurses miss the time with their families and familiar traditions.

But there’s no reason to let working holiday’s completely bum you out. There are plenty of ways you can spruce up your work setting and making even create a few new holiday traditions, like perhaps a glove Christmas tree.

Picking Good Gloves

If you’re making this at work, you are likely going to use what they’ve got in stock. There are so many different kinds of gloves and some of them lend themselves better to this process than others. For example, I found that latex gloves are the only ones I could find on the shelf that would blow up like a balloon. Vinyl gloves would blow up, but not very large, and it was a real challenge to tie a knock in the cuff to hold he air in.

For more instructions and original article.

Check out the classes we have at WeCareOnline: http://wecareonlineclasses.com/

Survival Tactics for Older Job Seekers

Age discrimination is a major reason older workers are struggling. In a 2013 survey by the AARP, 64 percent of adults 45 to 74 years old said they had seen some form of age discrimination, and 20 percent said they had been passed up for a job because of it. Proving you’ve been discriminated against is extremely difficult. “It becomes a lot of ‘he said/she said’ accusations,” says Gene Burnard, publisher of SeniorJobBank.org, a job search site for seniors. Worse, litigants may find themselves blacklisted from future jobs if prospective employers find out they filed a suit.

Rather than fight age discrimination, most seniors have no choice but to try and overcome it. The first hurdle is getting an interview when your resume may indicate you’ve been around the block a few times. Burnard recommends including only the years at your most recent jobs and placing more emphasis on skills than tenure. “Nobody’s interested in what you’ve done, but what you can do for them,” he says.

For more and original article.

Interested in becoming a Health Unit Coordinator?

Celebrating the Holidays in an Interfaith Family

You grew up with memories of Santa Claus and Christmas trees, but your spouse spent the holidays lighting a menorah and playing dreidel. If yours is one of the thousands of interfaith families in the United States or elsewhere, chances are you've either tried to find ways to incorporate the best of both traditions into your own family or agreed as a family to choose one faith and follow its traditions.

The holidays tend to bring the religious choices you've made into sharp focus. As a result, some interfaith families find December especially stressful, while others have discovered ways to make it a joyous time. Even families with religious differences that are not exactly "interfaith" — a Catholic / Protestant couple, for example — find themselves dealing with thorny issues about what to do during holidays.


For the rest of this article.

Learn what it takes to be a restorative aide.

Safety Tips for Home Health Care Workers

Home nurses and aides are exposed to many of the dangers that hospital workers face -- from tuberculosis to needlestick injuries -- but are working in completely uncontrolled environments, Rhonda Berlin Jarrell, RN, a former home nurse who now works as an injury prevention consultant in Alexandria, Virginia says. As a result, nearly one in 20 home health workers has a job-related illness or injury every year -- a rate approaching that for construction workers, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

House calls
Back strain is by far the most common injury among home health workers. In 2007, among the 55,440 reported injuries that resulted in nurses, psychiatric and home health aides having to miss work, more than 21,000 involved back injuries. The risks are particularly high for health aides who have to lift patients from their beds, chairs, toilets, and bathtubs. Moving patients around in their home can be a challenge, and not just because of stairs and clutter, Jarrell says. Many patients don't have the equipment -- such as lifts and adjustable beds -- that can ease the burden on caregivers. And home workers, unlike hospital staff, can't just call a coworker down the hall for help with a particularly heavy load.

Home aides and nurses can protect their backs by encouraging patients and their family members to invest in lifts and adjustable beds. Even more important, Jarrell says, workers should learn the proper body mechanics for lifting, preferably through annual training sessions.

For more and original article

Learn what it takes to be a Home Health Aide.

Clever Christmas Party Ideas for Senior Living

12 Days of Christmas

Find clever ways to incorporate everything from a partridge in a pear tree to twelve drummers drumming. This may include displaying topiary trees with candy pears, serving three (roast) french hens, hanging five golden wreaths to represent the rings and dressing up your tables to look like giant drums.

Have an Aussie Christmas

Break away from the white Christmas and celebrate the season the way they do downunder - on a scorching summer's day.

Use an inflatable children's pool filled with ice to hold your drinks, and decorate a gum tree rather than the traditional evergreen. Put on a barbecue, meatpies or some freshly grilled fish, crack a few ginger ales and break out the ausse slang, mate. Decorations could include Australian flora and fauna, shells and white sand and sandals.


For more ideas and original article.

Know someone interested in becoming an Activity Director?

Avoiding Extra Pounds During the Holidays

This is a hectic time of year.  We are all very busy working a full time job, part time job, managing the household, chauffeuring the kids to everyplace under the sun. The fall sports season is about to end, the winter sports season is gearing up. Holiday shopping is on your mind and you are behind schedule.  Your friends and family are beckoning you for visits,  your laundry is overflowing and you have to still figure out what to cook for dinner.

Does this sound familiar?  The holidays can be a stressful time of year.   There is so much stuff to do and the days don’t grant you extra hours to get it all done. The daylight turns to a night time sky earlier than you desire and you feel sleepy at 5 pm because of it.

On top of all of the above, it becomes difficult for many of us to eat healthy during the holiday season because we are always on the go and sometimes we make bad choices. Not to mention, we are perpetually surrounded by baked goods and delicious treats . . .

For More.

Interested in a career as an Activity Director?

Laughter Reduces Blood Sugar Levels

Laughter, it's said, is the best medicine. And there's lots of evidence that laughter does lots of good things for us.

It reduces pain and allows us to tolerate discomfort.

It reduces blood sugar levels, increasing glucose tolerance in diabetics and nondiabetics alike.

It improves your job performance, especially if your work depends on creativity and solving complex problems. Its role in intimate relationships is vastly underestimated and it really is the glue of good marriages. It synchronizes the brains of speaker and listener so that they are emotionally attuned.

Laughter establishes -- or restores -- a positive emotional climate and a sense of connection between two people, In fact, some researchers believe that the major function of laughter is to bring people together. And all the health benefits of laughter may simply result from the social support that laughter stimulates.

For More.

Interested in becoming a Restorative Aide?

How About Some Spending Money For The Holidays?

You may win a check for your tuition from We Care Online!

Wouldn't it be nice to sign up for a Nurse Aide course and get your money back?  We might just make that happen for you!  Beginning in December 2013, students registering for a Nurse Aide course will automatically be placed in a monthly drawing to win reimbursement of their course tuition. One student from Kansas and one student from South Dakota will win the drawing.

Yes, there are few rules that need to be met. But they are really simple rules.

• The student must be enrolled in a CNA class in Kansas or a NA class in South Dakota.
• The course must be PAID IN FULL.
• The student must have a passing grade for the course.

You will only be entered in the drawing when ALL OF THE
ABOVE apply.

And YES, facilities who register students could also be reimbursed.  Same rules apply.  

We are excited to start surprising some of our Nurse Aide students with this gift!  But remember, you can't get reimbursed unless you register and pay for your course.

Check out our website for more information on this great opportunity! Click Here

We also still have our Hardship Grant available for a few of our courses.  You can apply by Clicking Here.

We Care Online website: http://www.wecareonlineclasses.com/index.html

10 Ways to Make Yourself Indispensible to a Charge Nurse

Several factors can make a CNA or nurse aide truly valuable to the charge nurse.

1) BE AT WORK.
Really this can’t be repeated enough. Calling in at work does more damage to your reputation than most anything else short of abuse and/or neglect. In any industry, but particularly healthcare, nurses and aides are the single most important ingredient to continuity of good care. You know what happens when there are call ins- others have to pick up the slack. It’s not good. Be at work and call in only when you are TRULY so sick you cannot function as an aide. Let the nurses send you home if they so decide. The nurses will respect you so much more and keep you in high regard, if you come to work as scheduled.

2) BE AT WORK ON TIME.
Another issue that can’t be repeated enough. Nurses like having all the aides at work, ready to manage the units.

For More.

Know someone interested in becoming a CNA?

How to Balance School and Work as an Adult

Many health care workers work while taking classes at community colleges to try to get ahead. For community college students, more than a quarter work greater than 35 hours weekly. Additionally, nearly one-quarter of college students have dependent children.

In some cases, the rigors of juggling work and school prove to be too much. Given the choice between income and education, and faced with fewer dollars to go around in terms of student loans, many students leave college before attaining a degree, choosing the immediate reward of a paycheck over the expected reward of a higher-paying job upon graduation.


For these nontraditional students, it’s imperative to strategize about how to balance work and school. Using the tips outlined below, you can do both, without either one suffering.

1. Take assignments with you. While I advocate for keeping work and school separate, I do think you can fit in your schoolwork at other times during the day. For instance, if you’re sitting at your daughter’s soccer practice or folding laundry, use the time to study.

For more tips.

Interested in becoming a health unit coordinator?

How to Multitask as a Nurse Aide

What is Multitasking?

At some settings, nursing assistants are expected to take care of more than six patients in each shift. This is where your multitasking skills come in handy. Basically, multitasking is a talent to organize and execute two different types of tasks all at one time.

Yes! It is a Skill

There are no findings that nurse aides are provided with training on multitasking during the training classes. Accomplishing different tasks at one go is difficult. It totally depends on your mental and physical capacity to react to different things with equal control and panache. You will accumulate these skills as you spend some time in your occupation.

However, trying to finish two different types of works concurrently may slow you down. It will also restrict your brain to act to its fullest since you are trying to hit two birds with one stone. You will be more in stress and become exhausted very soon. Above all, it will lead to frustration if the outcome is not as expected.

For More.

Interested in starting your career in health care? Learn more about what it takes to become a Restorative Aide.

Home Health Named Best Partner in Reducing Hospital Readmissions

Partnering with home health care agencies is emerging as a new model of care and a core strategy in
preventing hospital readmissions, according to a new survey.

Home health partnerships were the number-one strategy that 73% of senior hospital leaders adopt to lower preventable readmissions, as noted in a survey conducted by HealthLeaders Media Intelligence Unit in collaboration with Amedisys.

Of the 106 senior leaders comprised of CEOs and physicians polled in the survey, 60% of hospitals said they already have selected home health care partners.

“Hospitals are seeing the benefit of collaborating with post-acute care partners in an effort to improve their patients’ health and prevent hospital readmissions  . . ."

For More.

Know someone interested in starting a career as a Home Health Aide?

CNA's: Staying Healthy at Work

The work we CNA’s do is HARD; some say brutal. The stress we put upon ourselves while performing our duties takes a high toll on our bodies. We have to take care of ourselves. And I mean that- especially at work.

Some of the things I do to make sure I’m ready and physically able to do my job are pretty mainstream, or so I thought. Lately I’ve noticed newer aides not bothering to do simple things that can make such a difference.

1) The usual items we hear about are par for the course: Eat right, exercise and get plenty of sleep! Easier said then done in today’s busy world. Family, friends, commitments, kids’ games and activities all keep us, at times, TOO busy to care for ourselves.

2) We use our legs, arms and backs for the vast majority of the tasks we perform. It makes sense to stretch these muscles before we use them.

For More. 

For More about how to become a CNA.

Job Outlook for Home Health Aides

As the baby boomer generation age, a need for healthcare services, and workers to adequately weather this increasing demand will rise.

One such career is that of a home health aide, an individual who has the capacity to assist and aide and individual with a medical condition within the comfort of their own home. Any career that can exceed a growth rate of over 25% in a 10 year period can be said to be growing faster than the national average. With regards to the job outlook for home health aide careers, the numbers are closer to 50% in a 10 year period. Personal assistant and home aide careers are expected to see tremendous growth as well through to 2018, showing the increasing need for in home services.

For More.

Know someone interested in starting a career as a Home Health Aide?

Like your health care career, but want a change of scenery?

No one will argue that the health care field is a challenging career. But even with the challenge, there are sometimes when we get tired of doing the same thing day in and day out. The monotony of a demanding routine can become too much for us and we need a change.

Unfortunately, for many nurses and CNAs this is the time when they decide to leave the bedside and pursue different careers. However, there are so many diverse specialties in this field that you can get a breath of fresh air in your career while still practicing what you love. One of the more exciting career changes you can pursue is flight nursing.

What do flight nurses do?

Flight nurses (also known as aero-medical nurses) play a critical role in patient care in some of the most emergent situations possible. They provide life supporting care while a patient is transported from medical facility to medical facility or in some cases, from the scene of an accident to a trauma center.

A flight nurse will work alongside a flight paramedic to deliver advanced critical care.

For More and the Original Article.

Starting a Career in Healthcare? Why not take an easy online Medical Terminology Course?