Home Care Glossary

Roles & People

The single point of contact at a home care agency who oversees scheduling, caregiver assignments, care plan updates, and family communication.

Roles & People

A high-performing caregiver designation reserved for the most experienced staff — used to start most new care cases and serve as on-call coverage for urgent staffing needs.

Roles & People

A trained, vetted professional (or unpaid family member) who provides hands-on support for an older adult's daily living needs.

Roles & People

The cumulative physical, emotional, and financial strain experienced by family caregivers — clinically measurable and predictably preventable with respite.

Roles & People

An everyday synonym for caregiver — the person providing day-to-day support for an older adult, whether family or professional.

Roles & People

An unpaid relative — usually an adult child, spouse, or sibling — who provides ongoing care for an older loved one.

Roles & People

A trained aide working under a Medicare-certified home health agency — typically for short-term help during a doctor-ordered home health episode.

Roles & People

A family member coordinating care for a parent or relative who lives more than an hour away — typically combining local professional care with remote oversight.

Roles & People

A trained aide who provides hands-on, non-medical help with bathing, dressing, toileting, and transfers — the most common professional caregiver role.

Health & Conditions

The six basic self-care tasks — bathing, dressing, toileting, transferring, continence, and eating — used to measure independence.

Health & Conditions

A measurable drop in memory, judgment, language, or executive function — ranging from mild changes to dementia.

Health & Conditions

The transition from a hospital admission back home — the highest-risk window for falls, medication errors, and 30-day readmission.

Health & Conditions

A return to the hospital within 30 days of discharge — the metric Medicare uses to measure transition-of-care success.

Health & Conditions

The complex tasks of independent living — managing money, medications, cooking, shopping, transportation, housework, and using the phone.

Health & Conditions

A measurable decline in memory or thinking that's greater than expected for age — but not severe enough to be dementia.

Health & Conditions

Care delivered after a hospital admission — in skilled nursing, inpatient rehab, home health, or at home with personal care support.

Health & Conditions

The pattern of confusion, agitation, or restlessness that worsens in the late afternoon and evening for many people with dementia.

Health & Conditions

Helping a person move safely between bed, chair, walker, wheelchair, toilet, or shower — a hands-on personal care skill.

Health & Conditions

The coordinated set of services — home care, follow-up calls, medication review — that bridge a person from hospital or rehab back to home life.

Health & Conditions

The dementia-related tendency to leave the home or move purposelessly through the house — a serious safety risk requiring environmental and supervisory controls.

Paying for Care

Private insurance that pays a daily benefit for home care, assisted living, or nursing facility care once the policyholder needs help with two or more ADLs.

Paying for Care

Private Medicare plans (Part C) that bundle hospital + medical + drug coverage and sometimes add limited supplemental benefits — but rarely cover ongoing home care.

Paying for Care

Medicare is age-based federal health insurance; Medicaid is income-based state-federal coverage. They pay for different kinds of long-term care.

Paying for Care

Michigan's Medicaid waiver that pays for home and community-based services so eligible adults can stay home instead of moving to a nursing facility.

Paying for Care

A monthly benefit on top of a VA pension for wartime veterans (or surviving spouses) who need help with daily activities — usable for home care.

Process & Planning

The practice of staying in your own home as you age, with the right support and home modifications, instead of moving to a facility.

Process & Planning

The free, in-home conversation an agency conducts before service starts to understand the client's needs and design the care plan.

Process & Planning

A scheduled meeting — in person or by phone — between the family, care coordinator, and clinical oversight to review the care plan and adjust it.

Process & Planning

A written document that defines what care is provided, when, by whom, and how it adjusts as the client's needs change.

Process & Planning

The principle of keeping the same small team of caregivers with a client over time — proven to improve outcomes, especially in dementia care.

Process & Planning

The combination of home modifications, balance and strength routines, footwear, lighting, and supervision that reduces fall risk.

Process & Planning

Physical changes to a home that make it safer for an aging adult — grab bars, ramps, walk-in showers, better lighting, and stair safety.

Process & Planning

Verbal prompts to take pre-set medications at the right time — what non-medical caregivers can do (vs. medication administration, which is nursing).

Process & Planning

A structured, in-person transition where a starting caregiver personally introduces and orients the ongoing caregiver to a client before stepping back — transferring lived knowledge a written care plan cannot.