Personal Care

Personal care services allow older adults to age in place while living with physical disabilities or a chronic health condition. These types of homecare include help with personal activities, such as dressing and bathing; seniors who receive private or personal homecare can maintain their independence and continue living at home instead of moving into an assisted living community.

What are Personal Care Services?

Personal care is one of the most common types of senior home care. Generally, this type of care involves a combination tasks and activities that are designed to ensure safety, comfort, and well-being for individuals with chronic health conditions or physical disabilities. Care will typically include things like bathing an elderly person when they cannot do it themselves or providing assistance so someone can safely complete daily living skills such as dressing themselves after surgery. Caregivers come to the home to assist with toileting, grooming, feeding, transferring and more.

One of the cornerstones to healthy living is having a personal caregiver assist with Activities of Daily Living, also known as ADLs. These tasks include dressing, grooming oneself and bathing which can be done by an experienced caregiver that will provide mobility and transfer assistance too.

Personal caregivers can offer home help with many different tasks, including errands, meal preparation, light housekeeping and medication reminders. Our caregivers also provide companionship to offset the risks of senior isolation.

Companion Care vs. Personal Care

When you need home care for your aging loved one, it can be challenging deciding what type of service will work best. Companion Care services tend to focus on social needs while personal-care services emphasize medical and physical needs.

When choosing elder care, the difference between companion and personal is an important consideration in the decision process as they both provide different benefits based on a person's individualized requirements. 

Home care companions can do your laundry, make you a delicious meal that's not just microwaved leftovers from the night before, and help out with errands like grocery shopping. They also provide emotional support to those who are grieving or struggling in their day-to-day lives due to illness or disability.

There are many reasons why we may recommend personal care services. Personal care is provided for those who require direct physical assistance due to a chronic health condition or some other circumstance that limits their ability to bathe and dress themselves, feed themselves, etc. 

If your loved one has difficulty with these tasks but does not need help from another person in order to complete them successfully on his/her own, then companion care might be more appropriate- it provides companionship so the individual can enjoy life's activities without needing constant supervision; this type of service also includes meal preparation and light housekeeping duties like laundry if needed

Does Medicare Pay for Personal Care at Home?

If your family member needs only assistance with homemaker or personal services, or companion care, Medicare will not cover the cost.

Medicare doesn't pay for:

• 24-hour-a-day care at home
• Meals delivered to your home
• Homemaker services (like shopping, cleaning, and laundry), when this is the only care you need
• Custodial or personal care (like bathing, dressing, or using the bathroom), when this is the only care you need

How Much Does In-Home Personal Care Cost?

According to the 2020 Genworth Cost of Care Study, the average national median cost for companion care (classified as homemaker services) was $54,912 ANNUALLY for a home health aide and $53,768 for a homemaker. The hourly rate for a home health aide ranged from $17.00 in Louisiana to $33.00 in Minnesota. The median cost for an hourly caregiver is $24.00 per hour.

Genworth calculates average median rates based on 44 hours per week. If your loved one only requires the help of a companion for a few hours per day or week, your costs may be significantly lower than these estimates. 

For a clearer picture of your potential costs, determine your loved one’s needs and contact Companion Services of America to inquire about companion care providers and average costs in your area.