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A Letter From |
| Thank you for your
interest in the National Network of ElderCare Advisors. We are building
a network of health care, social work and mental health professionals
to become care managers working within the ElderCare Advisors, Inc.
family. This network will enable efficient communication, and facilitate
referrals, billing, contracting, and marketing nationwide. It will
include training materials, policy and procedures guidelines, care
management forms, billing and collections support, and marketing assistance.
Eventually it will also enable access to low prices on hardware such
as computers and software, video teleconferencing equipment, cellular
and digital phones, pagers, telephone service and possibly even low
cost auto leasing and/or purchasing options (We want all of our care
managers to get there on time!). Our long-range business plan is to
develop contracts to provide eldercare and disability-care management
for employers, long-term care insurance companies, and managed care
companies.
We currently have several people in our group and anticipate considerable growth over the next few years. Our goal is to build an organization on our own merits with as little dilution from venture capital as possible. We seek first to serve and, second, to pay OURSELVES for doing so. The first step in joining is submission of your resume and subsequent completion of an application. Please forward your resume to me personally. My address:
Our first publication has been completed and can be ordered on the "Publications" page of this website. Our consumer and family guide to long-term care and professional manual for business operations will soon follow. With these training and education tools we will begin to bring consistency to the profession of eldercare and disability-care management. We believe that consistency and quality will make our network valuable for our members and our clients. It will also bring the kind of contracts we need to make care planning and care management a reliable, income-producing profession. Thank you again for your interest. I look forward to hearing from you soon. Sincerely, Joseph A. Jackson,
LICSW |
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Your Career As A Care Manager |
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On
Becoming - and Remaining - an Independent Care Manager: One Care
Manager's Story
Once upon time, I had a good job in health care. I was a professional at the top of my game and "unemployment" was a concept I could not imagine. My life was secure and had been for years - salary, vacation and sick time, health insurance - all in a row; all routine. Mortgage payments were always on time; my children had all they could ask for (and more); and my wife could work (or not) if she chose. Fortunately, she chose. Perhaps I should have seen my layoff coming. It just seemed so implausible - hired in July and laid off in September? That just didn't happen in my world. But the signs of job insecurity started almost immediately after I began my brief career in nursing home social work. Within a month and a half of my hire, both of the people with whom I had interviewed - the clinical administrator and the CEO - had themselves been laid off. Neither they nor I were incompetent. No, we fell victim to the same insidious calculation - the facility owner cared more about his pocketbook than he did about the people who worked for him (he knew he'd make out better if he surprised us when we least expected it). Three days after my layoff, I started ElderCare Advisors, Inc. and began my career as an independent care manager. Three years later, I am still standing. I am earning more in wages and benefits (although I now pay them for myself) than I was in my $50,000 per year Director of Social Work position in the nursing home, let alone in my direct service and administrative positions during 12 years as a home health care social worker. I have pieced together a composite career, that includes a few hours a week supervising other social workers/care managers, some per-diem work as a home care social worker (1-2 days per week, still standing!), and some marvelous opportunities to help people who consider my skills valuable and who pay me directly. I've also been able to help a few of my friends, nurses mostly, make some money doing what they do so well - medical management in the home. And there is no end in sight to the referrals that will be coming our way. The value of any service is in the difference it makes. Most elderly, chronically-ill, or physically disabled people want two things - to stay out of a hospital or nursing home and to preserve their life savings. A good care manager is as valuable to making this difference for them as any doctor or any lawyer ever was - and sometimes even more valuable. I keep a saying of Abraham Lincoln's on the wall in my home office. It reads, "Determine that the thing can and shall be done, and ... find a way." Nothing has been more important to the success of my practice than my belief in the value of what I do and my passion for doing it. If you want to become an independent care manager because it will enable you to fulfill your passion - to prevent unnecessary suffering and to help people heal and stay well - you can succeed. In a rural county in Western Massachusetts I found a way. So can you. |
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The Concept |
| The National Network of ElderCare Advisors (NNECA) is a growing support network of home health care, long-term care, social work and mental health professionals dedicated to preventing hospitalizations and nursing home placements among the chronically ill, the physically disabled, and the frail elderly. NNECA is not a "Professional Association." It is a business entity that is being collaboratively designed to create business opportunities for health care, mental health and medical social work professionals with home health care and long-term care backgrounds. NNECA seeks to promote opportunity for those who provide care-planning and medical-management services to be compensated well for doing so. It is a network of independent practitioners who share a common mission and a common approach to achieving it. Its main purpose is to provide training and business management support to its members to help them better manage the "necessary evils" of business start-up, marketing, time management, due diligence in practice, billing, record keeping and other entrepreneurial tasks that must be mastered by anyone who is self-employed. |
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Credentials |
| Please understand
that we are selective. Members must be either masters-level social
workers with a background in mental health and health care, preferably
with home health care experience, or RN's, PT's, or OT's with a background
in home health care and with some mental health training. We are also
interested in individuals with a business background who can provide
office management and marketing support.
We look forward to hearing from you soon. |