Home Instead Senior Care highlights “black economy” care concerns

Home Instead Senior Care, which provides home care services for our seniors, recently highlighted its concerns surrounding the growing “black economy” in the elderly care sector.

With a rapidly expanding population of over 65s, senior care services have never been more in demand and this has lead to a culture of unregulated, uninsured and unvetted carers providing services in the marketplace.

Home Instead Senior Care has warned of the consequences of availing of such unregulated services.  Danette Connolly, Director of Care, said that all care providers should be regulated and undergo external auditing processes, and this is something that Home Instead Senior Care has been campaigning for.

“Some of the statistics that are emerging surrounding senior care in Ireland are frightening.  There are a growing number of individual carers and companies providing home care services and are not following good practice. This can cause undue stress and worry to the senior and their family.”

Danette added, “Currently Ireland’s home care market is completely unregulated. Seniors are availing of care that is not monitored and some are directly employing carers, leaving themselves vulnerable as they are the employer but are not necessary fulfilling all the employer obligations, such as insurance cover, health and safety regulations and tax requirements.”

According to Linda Gallagher, Joint Managing Director of First Ireland, specialist Insurance Brokers to the care industry, people engaging carers through the black economy can find themselves in a vulnerable position if an accident occurs.

“It is most likely in such cases that the carer will not carry their own insurance cover.  In the senior care sector the number one claim relates to injuries caused either to the carer or the senior themselves by their moving and handling.  If the carer is not employed by a professional, insured senior care specialist company, and sustains an injury, they will be advised to sue the homeowner or whoever engaged their services.  In addition, the senior themselves will have no recourse to anybody in the event of them sustaining an injury.”

In order to administer competent and effective home care all care providers should be fully insured, attend to Garda vetting and the care staff should be trained, supervised and constantly monitored, which will alleviate a lot of stress and worry for seniors and their families.

Home Instead Senior Care CAREGivers are regularly monitored and undergo Gardai vetting.  Home Instead Senior Care was also recently awarded ISO certification which copper-fastens its commitment to quality care, customer service and continual improvement.

ISO 9001, which is administered by the International Organisation for Standardisation, is recognised globally as the guideline for establishing and maintaining an effective quality management system for businesses in any sector.

For further information about the services of Home Instead Senior Care log onto www.homeinstead.ie or call 051 333966

Former Dragon speaks at FREE business start-up seminar

Waterford City Enterprise Board’s ‘Fresh Start’ seminar at the Tower Hotel last Thursday attracted a large and enthusiastic audience of budding entrepreneurs.

Over 90 attendees listened to start up advice from Mary Doherty of Granny Maddox and Sean Egan of Sean Egan Artglass, and information on how to best develop an idea into a business from Liam Murphy of the Department of Social Protect and Ciaran Cullen, CEO, Waterford City Enterprise Board.

An inspiring and enlightening hour was provided by entrepreneur Sean Gallagher. Anecdotes, advice and encouragement was the theme of his talk, explaining that positivity and hard work is essential to success. “Surround yourself with like-minded positive people and avoid those who will bring negative elements into your life”, said the former Dragon.

Following a morning of uplifting speeches Ciaran Cullen was delighted with the event, “There was a great atmosphere in the room, principally supplied by Sean Gallagher’s presence and encouragement. You could tell that the audience were taking it all in. I was encouraged by both the number of attendees and the volume of interaction, especially during the Q&A session, it was really heartening.”

“We are planning a number of ‘Start your own business’ courses over the coming months and this morning we filled at least one of these courses”, Ciaran added.

Waterford City Enterprise Board offers support services for start-up and existing SME’s in Waterford city. If you have a new business idea or are running a business that requires assistance you can contact the Enterprise Board by phoning Celia on 051-852883 or logging on to www.waterfordceb.com.

13 year old Waterford student to address world’s largest entrepreneur conference

What do LinkedIn, Microsoft, Twitter, Amazon and Waterford’s Casey Games have in common? They will all be speaking at the world’s largest conference for entrepreneurs in the U.S. on May 17^th and18th.

Jordan Casey is the 13 year old Waterford student who rose to fame last year as the youngest person in Europe to develop an app for sale on the Apple App Store.

Following a year of worldwide seminars, conferences, innovation awards and four further successful game launches Jordan has been invited to speak at the prestigious 20^th Annual TiEcon conference, to be held in Santa Clara, California. Jordan is the youngest entrepreneur ever to speak at the Conference and will address the 4,000 delegates on the topic, “Things I learned the hard way as a young CEO.”

TiE is a global not for profit organisation focused on fostering and enabling entrepreneurship through mentoring, education and networking and is the world’s largest conference for entrepreneurs. The main speakers include Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn; Sajai Krishnan, GM of Amazon Web Services; Satya Nadella, President of Server & Tools Business at Microsoft, while other speakers are from Net flicks, Pay Pal, IBM, Intel, ESPN, Facebook, Twitter and Ericsson.

Since the age of 9 Jordan has been putting content on the web. In January 2012 he released the app, ‘Alien Ball vs. Humans’, described by Apple executives as a version of the classic ‘Space Invaders’ and was the first step on the ladder for this talented young developer.

In October 2012 he released a game called “Save the Day”; it was the official game for National Children’s day in Brazil. His first ‘complex’ game was called Greenboy Touch and was released in November 2012. It is based on a boy who finds himself lost in a forest. In early January this year he launched a multiplayer game called ‘Food World’ while in March he started working on his next game, ‘My Little World’ an adventure game about a tiny creature named JC who lives in a back garden and wants to see the real world. He is aiming for a June release.

Jordan is constantly in demand as a conference speaker, over the past few months he has spoken in Germany, England, France and India. He is just back from Amsterdam where he was invited to both the Festival of Games and the TNW Europe conference, labelled Europe’s most influential tech event. And while in California he has been invited to visit Adobe headquarters in San Jose.

At first Jordan’s parents, Clyde and Louise did not recognise the talent they had under their roof, “We are very of proud Jordan considering he taught himself how to code and write the programmes. He has worked so hard on this, but also gets lots of support. For instance Waterford City Council, Enterprise Ireland and Waterford City Enterprise Board are all supporting our trip to the States. We really could not have gone without their help,” said Clyde Casey.

So, what’s next for Jordan? As well as more games to be developed and launched, another aspect of the company is to encourage young kids to code. Jordan explained, “I’m just one of many young programmers in Waterford, I believe that if kids think ‘Coding is Cool’ they may develop an interest in increasing their own programming skills. Kids from seven years of age can learn some coding and programming themselves because of the technology available, however, coding and programming are not being taught as a subject in schools. I would like to make kids aware of coding and promote it.”

For more details on Casey Games follow Jordan’s blog on www.caseygameswebsite.blogspot.ie

Waterford City and County Enterprise Boards host Microfinance seminar

Lorna Coleman, Microfinance Ireland and Ciaran Cullen, WCEB

Over forty entrepreneurs from Waterford City and County received top business tips and advice at a lunchtime event last Wednesday April 24th at the Ramada Viking Hotel. 

Hosted by Waterford City and County Enterprise Boards the seminar focused on loans to small businesses which have been refused credit by financial institutions. 

Microfinance Ireland spoke of how there are a key measure in the Government’s “Action Plan for Jobs”. 

Lorna Coleman, Project Manager with Microfinance Ireland, gave a presentation on how the Microfinance scheme works and will encourage small businesses - whether they are looking for a vital piece of new equipment, looking to expand or if they are in the start-up. 

Lorna Coleman of Microfinance Ireland

Home Instead Senior Care awarded ISO certification

Home Instead Senior Care was recently awarded ISO certification which copper-fastens its commitment to quality care, customer service and continual improvement.

ISO 9001, which is administered by the International Organisation for Standardisation, is recognised globally as the guideline for establishing and maintaining an effective quality management system for businesses in any sector.

Since opening the doors of its Waterford office in 2009, HomeInstead Senior Care has grown steadily and now cares for over 200 clients, employs over seventy CAREGivers and is run by an office team of eight, including Director of Care, Danette Connolly and Director, Michael Connolly.

According to Danette the accreditation is an endorsement of Home Instead’s commitment to quality care to its clients in the community.  “Our company’s policy is not only to provide the optimum level of home care for seniors, but also to focus on and understand the needs of our clients and their families and to exceed those expectations.”

“Whilst this accreditation formally reinforces the quality of care and values we have always made available to our clients, it is also a huge reassurance to our clients of our commitment to adhering to quality standards in the areas of customer care, service delivery, CAREGiver hiring and training and continuous improvement”, Danette added.

Testament to this is the work that Home Instead has done in spearheading many

positive health initiatives and brought awareness to a multitude of senior’s issues including; Care Choices for Seniors, osteoporosis and fall prevention awareness, Positive Ageing Solutions, elder abuse awareness, tax relief incentives and much more.

Another step in Home Instead’s journey to continue to improve and develop is its dedication to being recognised as “A Great Place to Work”. This global scheme helps organisations identify, create and sustain great workplaces through the development of high-trust workplace cultures. Home Instead is committed to building an inspirational workplace for employees, involving employees to help implement positive changes and listening to employee opinion in order to become an employer of choice.

For further information about the services of Home Instead Senior Care log onto www.homeinstead.ie or call 051 333966.

Christchurch NS goes “Down the Rabbit Hole”

Christchurch National School brings its fun, exciting and adventure packed production of “Alice in Wonderland” to Garter Lane from May 15^th to 17^th.

Following the success of the schools production of “Over the Rainbow” in 2011, the pupils, from Junior Infants through to Sixth Class, will all feature in the much loved Lewis Carroll’s classic about a girl who falls down a rabbit hole into a fantasy world populated by peculiar, human-like animals.

According to Claire Reidy, teacher and producer of Alice in Wonderland, all of the children have been bitten by the performing bug.  “The children have taken this play to heart and are having so much fun rehearsing the songs and dance moves. What makes it even more exciting, and slightly nerve-wracking, is that they will be performing at Garter Lane, which is a wonderful home to children’s theatre, art, comedy and dance in Waterford city.”

Claire added “Every single child in the school is involved in the play.  As we draw nearer to curtain up, the excitement is building and building and the talk of the school is Alice, The Mad Hatter, The Red Queen and all the other remarkable characters.”

According to Janet Twigg, Principal Christchurch NS, the theme of the show came from the proverb Fear makes the wolf bigger than he is.  “We felt that this theme was particularly appropriate for our young cast. It deals with Alice’s fears as she moves through Wonderland and her eventual triumph as she stands firm against that which she fears most.”

“Apart from the Mums, Dads and terribly proud grandparents, our 2011 production was very well attended by local schools and community groups and we expect that this year’s production will attract the same interest”, Janet added.

If you fancy a trip down the rabbit hole for a hair - raising, fun - filled, adventure - packed musical, tickets are available for the matinee and evening performances  from Garter Lane Box Office on 051 855038 or by visiting www.garterlane.ie

‘Get on your bike’ for The Ronald McDonald House

Rotary club of Waterford appeals to the public to join in its annual charity cycle.

 

The Rotary club of Waterford Ronald Mc Donald Fun Cycle takes place again this year on Sunday May 12^th 2013 at Mc Donald’s on the Cork Road. Starting at 11.00 am the cycle travels to Tramore and back.

The Charity Cycle, now in its fourth year, is an opportunity for anyone who cycles and believes in helping a good cause. Regular participants are those who have stayed in the house or those who know a family who have stayed in the Ronald McDonald House, and wish to give something back.

Waterford Rotary appeals to cyclists of all ages to join. No pre-registration is required, just get the bike out or borrow one and join in for two hours on May 12^th. All are welcome.

To top it all, WLR fm’s Timmy Ryan will be broadcasting live from McDonalds on the Cork road and Ronald Mc Donald will join in the fun on the day. All cyclists will be treated to a Free Burger after the cycle plus lots of other treats on the day.

 The Ronald McDonald House provides a home-away-from-home for families of seriously ill children who are hospitalised or undergoing extended treatment at Our Lady’s Hospital for Sick Children, Crumlin. Families will be able to stay for the duration of their child’s stay in hospital. The Ronald McDonald House provides a supportive environment for these families. The first Irish Ronald McDonald House was a 15,000 square feet stand alone building in the grounds of Our Lady’s Hospital for Sick Children, Crumlin. The House can accommodate up to 16 families in en-suite family bedrooms with communal kitchens, dining areas and living areas. It also has a toddlers’ room and full laundry facilities.

Since opening in November 2004 the House has been “home” to over 1000 families from all over Ireland. Some have stayed for just a few nights, while others stay for 7 or 8 months!  The beauty of the house is that each room accommodates 4 so grannies, granddads, brothers and sisters can all help in the child’s recovery.

The annual running costs are in excess of €300,000 and the charity is very dependent on the continuing support of all to cover the ongoing costs of running the House.

Sponsorship cards are available from Mc Donald’s City Centre or Cork Road, Lily O'Brien’s and Nolke Opticians, or you can donate directly for this good cause by logging on www.mycharity.ie, go to “Sponsor a Friend” and search for Rotary Waterford.