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Home healthcare staff have few protections under law

Respiratory Care Weekly, December 20, 2006

As more Baby Boomers age, the need for home healthcare professionals will increase by 70% in the next eight years, according to statistics quoted by attorney and University of Iowa employment law professor Peggie Smith. Her research shows that many home healthcare staff are women with little education; some of them illegal immigrants getting paid under the table. This scenario affords little protection against workplace dangers under the law, even for licensed RTs making home visits to COPD patients on oxygen.

"The problem the government faces is, how do you regulate the employment relationship of someone who works in a private home?" Smith says. "We tend to think of home as a safe place. Yet the reality is that most homes are not designed to accommodate safe care practices. For instance, a throw rug on the floor of a client's hom

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