Do you have procedures for an emergency at your agency?
The coronavirus has put home care and geriatric care management agencies in a terrible bind. Most GCM ‘s or home care agencies had no emergency procedure in place for any disaster but even if they did a pandemic was not anticipated by almost anyone in the catalog of emergencies.
AGING LIFE CARE ASSOCIATION HELP WITH CORONAVIRUS
Now that it is upon us geriatric care managers can benefit from the Aging Life Care Association’s webinars on Zoom to help their ALCA and geriatric Care Management agencies. The ability of any care management agency, serving frail elders, to function despite an emergency is critical. For example for members the have an upcoming Webinar through Zoom-TAKING ON NEW CLIENTS WHILE BEING “QUARANTINED”, which is incredibly valuable
They offer a daily blog for geriatric care managers with updates on an ALCA of GCM Practice under the coronavirus threat and are much-needed resources in these highly traumatic times. With agencies unable to directly see clients in states where like California have imposed at Stay at Home order where geriatric care manager cannot see their clients except virtually and on top of that both care staff and care management staff may have come down with the virus, information about how to keep your agency going is invaluable. Membership in ALCA could be very valuable to geriatric care managers. If you join tell them I sent you.
NEED FOR AN EMERGENCY PLAN FOR EVERY DISASTER
An emergency plan for all emergencies is necessary for all geriatric care management and ALCA 
agencies. With massive hurricane Dorian lasting 2 weeks last year and the west once again facing massive wildfires, tornados already wreaking devastation this season and the polar vortex perhaps coming again next year-do you have emergency procedures?
Informal agency emergency procedures work in a start-up care management business but what if the solo practitioner is ill and out?
If illness, accident, some other unforeseen event overtakes an owner or manager, no emergency procedures can be suicide in an emergency, not to mention liability to your elderly clients.
You could be like these two GCM’s who lost their businesses in weather events that knocked them out.
PARADISE FIRE DEVASTATION OF A GERIATRIC CARE MANAGEMENT PRACTICE
GCM Jim Boyd of Paradise, California lost everything in the catastrophic fire in the town of Paradise, where he lived and practiced. He was trying to check on an aging client in Paradise, located in the midst of the Sierra forest when the huge forest fire immolated the entire town. Although a Go Fund Me 
started by the Aging Life raised almost $10,000 for Jim, he did not have enough to rebuild his home where he had his home-based GCM business. Then he and 90% of the residents of Paradise never returned.
Every geriatric care professional needs a formal, written backup plan that dictates action, should a disaster or emergency arise.
It ‘s necessary to assess your company’s risk of temporary or permanent service disruption if a disaster or emergency is experienced. This may seem an overwhelming task at first, but when you break it down into pieces, it becomes workable.
Learn about preparing for emergencies how you can prepare you, your clients and staff for disasters and absences of key personnel.
With pandemic’s, global warming’s effects causing floods, larger hurricanes, and the specter of more catastrophic weather events, you need to prepare now. Get the new Handbook of Geriatric Care Management 4th edition now– or out in Kindle or hardback with an excellent chapter on how to prepare your agency for disasters, plus forms to use, by GCM President Liz Barlow.
