Move over Mary Kay. A new business is operating in St. Albert and it comes with a bright pink car.
Nurse Next Door is a home health care company that started operating in St. Albert last month. The business is focused mainly on providing seniors with companionship and care in their own homes but will provide extra care in seniors’ facilities as well, said owner Kelly Voisey, a Beaumont resident with 10 years experience as a registered nurse.
The aim is to be a supplement to publicly funded health care and not a replacement, she said.
“There’s such a gap there between what Alberta Health Services can provide because they are overrun with this population,” Voisey said.
“Seniors’ number-one fear is loss of independence and having to go into a nursing home. I want to help a senior stay in their home as long as possible.”
Voisey has a pool of 24 caregivers that she draws from, including registered nurses and licensed practical nurses. As a company, she offers medical and non-medical care ranging from basic companionship to end-of-life care and complex nursing.
Two hours of companionship costs $50. Other prices vary depending on the complexity.
Senior and home health care services is a leading growth sector in the franchising world, with the number of listings expanding 29 per cent last year, according to the Canadian Franchise Association.
Private home care has been around for 100 years but Nurse Next Door co-founders John DeHart and Ken Sim felt the industry was lacking proper screening and customer service after having negative experiences hiring care for loved ones.
The pair started the Vancouver-based company in 2001 with a vision to carefully screen all caregivers and provide “hotel-style” service, said co-founder John DeHart.
The company started franchising in 2007 and now have 37 locations across Canada, including three in the Edmonton area.
A key to the company’s marketing strategy is bright pink cars, which came about when the partners realized that leasing one of these moving billboards would cost one-tenth the price of a stationary billboard.
“In markets where we’ve been for a long time, like Vancouver, everybody knows the pink cars,” DeHart said.
Alberta is seeing a huge influx of private health care businesses, said Donna Wilson, a health care researcher with the University of Alberta.
“The message has been out very clear since 1993, the government would love to see private health care and there’s obviously some public demand,” Wilson said. “Part of the issue is that [public] home care is really underfunded.”
An aging population that wants to remain at home as long as possible can put a big burden on families, which makes private care a beneficial service, Wilson said. However, she feels that some services shouldn’t be falling into the private realm.
“If you’re getting care by an RN or an LPN, that’s probably something that should be publicly funded,” she said.
While there are many private companies that provide home care, Nurse Next Door is differentiating itself by being more high profile, Wilson said.
This approach will likely mean success for Nurse Next Door, said St. Albert resident June Bailey, who found it hard to find private care for her aging mother.
“I know people who are looking as we speak and have not been able to find anybody,” she said.
