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Invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature
BACKGROUND: Healthcare aides (HCAs) are the primary caregivers for vulnerable older persons. They have many titles and are largely unregulated, which contributes to their relative invisibility. The objective of this scoping review was to evaluate the breadth and depth of the HCA workforce literature...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2015
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4511030/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26203297 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12912-015-0090-x |
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author | Hewko, Sarah J. Cooper, Sarah L. Huynh, Hanhmi Spiwek, Trish L. Carleton, Heather L. Reid, Shawna Cummings, Greta G. |
author_facet | Hewko, Sarah J. Cooper, Sarah L. Huynh, Hanhmi Spiwek, Trish L. Carleton, Heather L. Reid, Shawna Cummings, Greta G. |
author_sort | Hewko, Sarah J. |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: Healthcare aides (HCAs) are the primary caregivers for vulnerable older persons. They have many titles and are largely unregulated, which contributes to their relative invisibility. The objective of this scoping review was to evaluate the breadth and depth of the HCA workforce literature. METHODS: We conducted a search of seven online bibliographic databases. Studies were included if published since 1995 in English, peer-reviewed journals. Results were iteratively synthesized within and across the following five categories: education, supply, use, demand and injury and illness. RESULTS: Of 5,045 citations screened, 82 studies met inclusion criteria. Few examined HCA education; particularly trainee characteristics, program location, length and content. Results in supply indicated that the average HCA was female, 36–45 years and had an education level of high school or less. Home health HCAs were, on average, older and were more likely to be immigrants than those working in other settings. The review of studies exploring HCA use revealed that their role was unclear – variation in duties, level of autonomy and work setting make describing “the” role of an HCA near impossible. Projected increased demand for HCAs and high rates of turnover, both at the profession and facility-level, elicit predictions of future HCA shortages. Home health HCAs experienced comparatively lower job stability, earned less, worked the fewest hours and were less likely to have fringe benefits than HCAs employed in hospitals and nursing homes. The review of studies related to HCA illness and injury revealed that they were at comparatively higher risk of injury than registered nurses and licensed practical nurses. CONCLUSIONS: This is the largest, most comprehensive scoping review of HCA workforce literature to date. Our results indicate that the HCA workforce is both invisible and ubiquitous; as long as this is the case, governments and healthcare organizations will be limited in their ability to develop and implement feasible, effective HCA workforce plans. The continued undervaluation of HCAs adversely impacts care providers, the institutions they work for and those who depend on their care. Future workforce planning and research necessitates national HCA registries, or at minimum, directories. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12912-015-0090-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4511030 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2015 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-45110302015-07-23 Invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature Hewko, Sarah J. Cooper, Sarah L. Huynh, Hanhmi Spiwek, Trish L. Carleton, Heather L. Reid, Shawna Cummings, Greta G. BMC Nurs Research Article BACKGROUND: Healthcare aides (HCAs) are the primary caregivers for vulnerable older persons. They have many titles and are largely unregulated, which contributes to their relative invisibility. The objective of this scoping review was to evaluate the breadth and depth of the HCA workforce literature. METHODS: We conducted a search of seven online bibliographic databases. Studies were included if published since 1995 in English, peer-reviewed journals. Results were iteratively synthesized within and across the following five categories: education, supply, use, demand and injury and illness. RESULTS: Of 5,045 citations screened, 82 studies met inclusion criteria. Few examined HCA education; particularly trainee characteristics, program location, length and content. Results in supply indicated that the average HCA was female, 36–45 years and had an education level of high school or less. Home health HCAs were, on average, older and were more likely to be immigrants than those working in other settings. The review of studies exploring HCA use revealed that their role was unclear – variation in duties, level of autonomy and work setting make describing “the” role of an HCA near impossible. Projected increased demand for HCAs and high rates of turnover, both at the profession and facility-level, elicit predictions of future HCA shortages. Home health HCAs experienced comparatively lower job stability, earned less, worked the fewest hours and were less likely to have fringe benefits than HCAs employed in hospitals and nursing homes. The review of studies related to HCA illness and injury revealed that they were at comparatively higher risk of injury than registered nurses and licensed practical nurses. CONCLUSIONS: This is the largest, most comprehensive scoping review of HCA workforce literature to date. Our results indicate that the HCA workforce is both invisible and ubiquitous; as long as this is the case, governments and healthcare organizations will be limited in their ability to develop and implement feasible, effective HCA workforce plans. The continued undervaluation of HCAs adversely impacts care providers, the institutions they work for and those who depend on their care. Future workforce planning and research necessitates national HCA registries, or at minimum, directories. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12912-015-0090-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. BioMed Central 2015-07-22 /pmc/articles/PMC4511030/ /pubmed/26203297 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12912-015-0090-x Text en © Hewko et al. 2015 This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Hewko, Sarah J. Cooper, Sarah L. Huynh, Hanhmi Spiwek, Trish L. Carleton, Heather L. Reid, Shawna Cummings, Greta G. Invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature |
title | Invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature |
title_full | Invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature |
title_fullStr | Invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature |
title_full_unstemmed | Invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature |
title_short | Invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature |
title_sort | invisible no more: a scoping review of the health care aide workforce literature |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4511030/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26203297 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12912-015-0090-x |
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