Home Care Delivery

In Florida, there are three types of agencies providing home care (homemaking, companion, and personal care) services:

• Homemaker Companion Agencies (HCA) pay about $50 to secure a license that allows them to provide only homemaking and companion services. They are NOT audited or reviewed by AHCA and they are NOT authorized to provide any personal care (assistance with dressing, feeding, toileting, bathing, transferring, etc.)
• Home Health Agencies (HHA) focusing on Home Care can provide all three services including Personal Care. They are regulated by AHCA and are audited periodically.
• Nurse Registries (NR) are also licensed, regulated, and audited by AHCA, with most of the requirements being the same as those of a home care focused HHA. The primary difference is a NR refers caregivers that are treated as independent contractors and HHAs employ their caregivers.

All three entities have their respective strengths. We’ll provide some of those related to the NR model (the one we use) in subsequent posts.