Aging Population Creates Space for More Eldercare Services

Two articles from newspapers in Minneapolis-St. Paul and Dallas discussed different eldercare services this week. Taken together they highlight how the growth in the elderly population in the United States is creating changes in how eldercare services are being offered, and how new business models are being created to perform these services.

The first article, from The Dallas Morning News, discusses home care agencies and in particular, the growth of franchises offering home care services.

Some 11,000 licensed home-care businesses served 7.6 million people last year, according to the American Association of Homes and Services for the Aging. And in-home aides are projected to be the second fastest-growing job over the next decade – the government forecasts a 50 percent increase, from 767,000 to 1.2 million jobs.

Though "mom and pop" businesses have dominated home care, entrepreneurs have propelled the recent growth by opening franchises to capitalize on the expected doubling of the older population by 2030.

Next, this article from the Star-Tribune focused on a company started by four nurses that provides eldercare assessments as well as managing ongoing care.

Two partners spend two hours or more on an assessment, Buelow said, speaking both to the senior and to family members. They spend 10 to 15 hours writing a report, which details a family's options for meeting a parent's needs.

The partners will conduct family meetings, sometimes including out-of-state siblings joining in on cellular phones, to go over the assessment and present the options . . .