International Comparisons
Long-Term Care Workers in Five Countries: Issues and Options
Research Report
Sophie Korczyk, Ph.D
June 2004
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This study examined the long-term care (LTC) paraprofessional workforce (such as nurse's aides) in five countries: Denmark, France, the Netherlands, Canada, and Australia. It found that LTC workers share many of the same features with each other and with their counterparts in the United States. For example, the overwhelming majority of care workers are female and many are age 45 or older. All five countries face problems concerning pay, hours, training, and the care worker's role in service delivery. Although adequate pay is the foundation on which workforce improvements must be built, the study suggests that other elements also are important:
- Many care workers put in uncompensated time (for example, in care planning or client-to-client travel), which decreases their effective earnings per hour.
- Many of the workers want full-time jobs, with adequate wages and benefits, rather than part-time or irregular hours.
- Training care workers, particularly those who provide home care, becomes more important as medical advances permit more persons with complex needs to live in the community rather than in specialized institutions. Training also is necessary to provide the horizontal and vertical career mobility that will keep workers in the profession.
- The care worker's frontline role needs to be recognized in service delivery. A better paid and better trained workforce will provide better care, which should be the ultimate goal of workforce policies.
This Issue Paper was written by Sophie Korczyk and published by the AARP Public Policy Institute. For further information, please contact Enid Kassner at 202/434-3863. (41 pages)
Pub ID: 2004-07