Connections! in SW Florida - Featuring Mags Palma with Seniors First Home Care

Good morning, Southwest Florida, and those with us near and far. My name is Renee Han, and I'm bringing you Connections in Southwest Florida today. I've got Mags with me, and I'm excited to tell you about her business in just a moment. But first, I wanted to give you a backdrop. Connections in Southwest Florida was really started during the very front of this COVID situation when we came to the quick realization that how we did business, at least temporarily, whatever that might be for each business, was gonna be different immediately, overnight. You know, it wasn't something that we were all preparing for over a long period of time. And in my business, I have some tools that I leverage to do what I do, and I thought they could be very applicable to being able to feature entrepreneurial businesses and leaders in the community. And so that's what we do. It was a quick decision. We got it up and running. And I think I'm on week 6 now of getting to highlight some of the businesses. So this morning, I am very excited to bring you Seniors First Home Care. And I've got Mags here to talk about it. And Mags, before we get started in the business, I always like to give people the opportunity to meet you and learn a little bit more about you. So would you be kind enough to tell us a little bit about yourself?

Absolutely. Thank you, Renee, and good morning, everybody. So, uh, from a personal point of view, I always like to start with the fact that I'm the proud mother of two young girls, uh, they are 5 and 2, uh, and we moved, uh, here to Naples a little bit less than a year ago from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with my husband. So We're delighted to be here. We escaped the cold winters of Pittsburgh and we're very happy to be here. Naples is a great place to grow as a family. So we couldn't be happier.

That's fantastic. You may know this, Mags, but I can't tell you how many Pennsylvania families have come down to the Naples area. In fact, this week I was just doing a home inspection with another family that's moving here from Pennsylvania. So you're in good company.

As long as they're all Steelers fans, right?

Absolutely. Well, and I'm sure you know this having been here a year now that you're in paradise, you will get visitors that you may see more of down here in Florida than you did living, you know, an hour away from you in Pennsylvania. That's just how it happens.

Absolutely. I've met so many people around my community actually who are from Pennsylvania. It's amazing, as you said, to, to see so many people from up north living in Naples. It's, it's like I said, it's a great city. We've met wonderful people here, so we, we couldn't be happier.

Well, we're thrilled to have you as part of the community, and I was impressed with you before, but I'm now even more impressed because not only did you move here and move your whole family and two lovely children here a year ago, but during that time you also managed to start up a business.

Absolutely, yes.

Quite impressive. So, Megs, tell us a little bit about Seniors First Home Care. And I wanna start with, Megs, what was your inspiration? So you had a lot of things going on as it was, moving here and getting acclimated to a new area. Tell us what motivates you to start the business.

Yeah, so it really came from personal reasons, Renee. My mother was diagnosed several years ago with breast cancer, and unfortunately, she, her breast cancer was then terminal. And my husband and I both have healthcare backgrounds, and so we really were my mother's eyes and ears for everything during her illness. We were there to remind her to take her medications, you know, as she was going through chemotherapy. We were going with her to her chemotherapy sessions and following up with doctor's appointments. There were times where she was getting very tired and, you know, we were obviously doing all the bits and pieces around the house for her. So my husband and I realized that, you know, my mother was not the only one in this situation. And unfortunately, you know, my mother did pass away from her breast cancer. But we were inspired during that time to to want to help other people that, you know, may not have, you know, terminal cancer, but they're obviously aging. And my husband and I thought, you know, we— how can we help them and how can we, you know, provide the assistance that they need on a daily basis? And so that's when we decided we wanted to start a home care agency to really look after the most vulnerable out there and provide our services to them.

Can I just pause for a moment, Mags? Because first of all, I want to celebrate the fact that you took a personal situation and saw a need and, and, and could have moved on with yourself and gone back to what you were doing before all of this happened in your own personal life. And you saw an opportunity and decided to embrace it and use it to help others. And I just want to for a moment, you know, celebrate that because I find, you know, there's, there's a lot of different business leaders in different industries industries and segments. But when you can take something and someone who has just in the seed of their being a true passion for something, nothing but success can come from that. And I don't just mean your success. I mean the success of all of the others that you help. So just for a moment before we dive deeper into your business, I just want to celebrate you and celebrate the inspiration from your mother. So thank you so very much for that. Thanks, Renee. And I have to imagine it's interesting because, you know, during times of, I'll say crisis, call it what you will, but COVID for some created a crisis. Hurricanes create a crisis. When you have these situations where you suddenly can't connect with people the way you have in the past, and I'm talking families, right? People during COVID were having to stay at home and their family may not have been able to visit them and do things. I've got to imagine that creates a new sense of appreciation for the types of services that you offer, because whether we're 2 miles away and can't get to our family, or we're hours or a continent away from our families, there's an assurance that comes with knowing that our family members are in good hands. So with that, Mags, tell us a little bit about the services that Seniors First Home Care offers, because I think it's so, so relevant. All the time, but certainly now.

Absolutely. As you mentioned, you know, now more than ever. But our home care agency provides what we call personal and companion care to seniors. And I would like to say also adults in need of assistance of activities for daily living. So just like my mother who was battling terminal cancer, she wasn't very old, but, you know, she needed help with medication and shopping and sometimes getting dressed. So these are the types of activities that we provide to seniors. And, you know, we, what we try to do is we try to work with each client and really try to understand what their needs are. And then we try to match, you know, that need with the most suitable caregiver. So You know, not everybody is the same and we know we want to make sure that we pair the most appropriate caregiver to that client.

No, that's fantastic. And let me ask this because my mind is racing. Do you tend to do long-term care? Is it more situational if somebody's had a surgery or an accident? Tell us a little bit about what kind of circumstances might bring are coming in and what kind of care packages?

Absolutely, yes. So we actually is both. So we will look after people who are being discharged from the hospital and they need maybe short-term care during that time. But a lot of our clients actually are clients who are gonna be long-term. Many people, as you said before, don't have relatives nearby. A lot of people are moving from,, you know, the northern states to Florida, and their sons or daughters are far away. So these are clients that require long-term care, and we make sure that we look after them as long as it's needed. What we want to do is to really be able to be there for them in the comfort of their home and provide the assistance that they need so that, you know, they don't have to leave their home. No one wants to go to a hospital right now. So we We make sure that we provide them with all the assistance that is required to make their life as comfortable as possible at home so that they can stay at home and enjoy their lives and provide them with whatever help that they require.

That's great. And let me ask this, and I'm probably gonna slaughter, there's probably categories that have appropriate names and I'm gonna totally slaughter 'em, but I think of, in-home care takes sort of two categories, right? One is more companionship coming with and helping with basic living things, and one is more healthcare-related where somebody may administer things. Do you guys do one or both of those?

Yeah, that's a great question. So we are a non-skill home care agency. So that means that We are not going to be, you know, sending physical therapists or, you know, someone that is going to be looking after the medical side of things. We provide what we call, you know, personal care and companion care. So it's non-skilled, and we make sure that we assist the seniors with any activities that they need, you know, during the day. And, you know, we provide that assistance 24/7.

Well, and I do want to point out, even though, Mags, you may not be administering medical care, the rigor and requirements for your type of work, I think, are really important for people to know about. Because one of our, you know, one of our fears, if my mother's not at a point in her life where she needs something like this, but I can almost guarantee when she does, that burden of helping make the decision of a trusting in-home partner, because that's very personal, is has got to be a challenging decision to make. Could you talk, Mags, a little bit, given that, about the stringent requirements that you go through as a company and organization and what you do to provide the same assurance for those that you hire to be in the homes?

Yeah, so that's a great question, Renee, because unlike some nursing registries that are out there that do provide some home care. Our agency actually is licensed, bonded, and insured. So this is obviously some reassurance for clients out there looking for home care to make sure that the people that are going to be going to their homes, you know, are trustworthy. And our caregivers are trained extensively before we send them to any client's home. And we make sure that we follow up with every client on a regular basis. We actually are very lucky. Part of our staff are physicians, nurses. So while we don't actually provide medical care, we all have healthcare backgrounds, which allows us to understand the clinical implications of certain clients and We train our caregivers in the areas of dementia, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, chronic diseases, so they understand the needs of each client a little bit better. And so as an organization, we take very seriously the training of our caregivers. We wanna make sure that our caregivers are compassionate, well-trained, and right now, obviously, we are making sure that our clinicians are going to clients' homes with the proper attire as well during this COVID-19 crisis. So we are following all of the CDC guidelines and state and local requirements. And as an agency, we go through a lot of paperwork in order to make sure that we are licensed through the Agency for Healthcare Administration. So it's a lot of paperwork, but we obviously are committed to the safety and well-being of our clients and our caregivers.

Now that's fantastic and so important. And I know that we've already talked about the fact that you guys don't, you know, your services are not to provide healthcare, medical healthcare, but the fact that you have so many people that have healthcare backgrounds and you're developing pretty intimate relationships and observations with people, I've got to imagine that even gives you a sense to maybe be in a unique position to flag things for family members to say, hey, I'm not here in this capacity, but I've noticed some things might be changing. You may wanna talk to your physician. And so that's another great added bonus.

Absolutely. And what we do is every time we have a potential client, we go to their homes, see the staff here, the healthcare, our physician and nurses go to the client. And what we do is we conduct a free assessment at home where we can identify what the needs are. So perhaps there's some degree of dementia or people might be at risk of falls. So we really look at what is the most appropriate care. And what we try to do always is we always try to focus on what seniors can do instead of really focusing on what they cannot do. Because what we try to do is obviously provide them with a better quality of life, and how can we reinforce the things that people are still able to do. And so that way, you know, we don't focus on, oh, you, you're no longer able to do this. And, you know, we, we really try to provide them with the most appropriate care that they, that they require.

Yeah, no, that's so important for healthy mind as well, because we all know, you know, none of us necessarily desire to have to become dependent on the help of others. So that's a great perspective to have. I imagine it probably varies because you talked about doing a needs assessment when you come in. Yeah, but are you, you know, do you come in just periodically each day? Is it a weekly thing? What, what do the services usually entail?

Yeah, so it's dependent on the client. We have some clients that require home care for a long period of time, for many hours a day. Typically, we have clients who are a few times a week, anywhere between 4 to 6 hours. And really, that allows them to have someone at the home to help them with their— reminding them about their medication, Also, you know, preparing a special diet that they may need. So we're there to make sure that, you know, obviously they eat healthy and they eat as they should. So it really all depends on, you know, what the needs are of a particular client. So, you know, we don't try to, you know, cookie-cutter this. It's really unique to every single client. And that's why we like to conduct an assessment at home to make sure, you know, what is the most appropriate care for them? So we can match, you know, the client needs again with the most suitable caregiver.

No, and that's so important. I can speak from a place of a little experience. My husband's mother has Alzheimer's and there was a period of time where she was not ready to go live in a home and still wanted to stay where she was. But having someone like your services, this was up in Ohio, visit, helped us to monitor when that was changing, when she was no longer capable of knowing when to take her medications, when she was forgetting to eat meals, and having that person there. I'm not sure how long it would have taken the family to detect some of those things that the onsite home care person was really able to play a vital role for us in managing her care and, and her safety. So I can't say enough about how important that is.

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, as we all age, obviously we want to make sure that we age well. And, you know, I know my mother, she didn't want to go to a hospital and she wanted to stay home as much as possible. This is where she was comfortable. And, you know, up until the final hours, you know, she was home. You know, we Unfortunately, it was on Christmas Day when she passed away, but we kept her home. We kept her home until the very last few hours until we took her to the hospital. So I know this from personal experience. People want to stay at home as much as possible, and we want to make sure that there's someone that is compassionate with them and looking after them. So we make sure that we have the right people in people's homes.

Fantastic. Well, we talked a little bit, Mags, you were talking about taking precautions in the COVID situation. You know, has there been anything that you guys have had to be— do drastically different with COVID Are you able to provide your services? You know, we know the people's needs didn't change just because of COVID So tell us a little bit about how COVID's affected how you guys do business and is everything still available in terms of services?

Yeah, so, you know, from an infection control perspective, we looked at all of our policies again to make sure that obviously we were following all the recommendations from the CDC and the state and local agencies. But yeah, from a hygiene and safety perspective, we, we have a lot of the, what we call the personal protective equipment for our staff. So if there's a potential client that is, that might be COVID-19 positive, or, you know, has been diagnosed with COVID-19, we continue to provide our services to that client, but we make sure that our caregivers are safe in providing the service. So we have all of the necessary personal protective equipment. And then the other thing that we do is we actually have devices here that will test antibodies of COVID-19 into our caregivers. So if there was any suspicion that any of our caregivers may have it, we can actually administer that that test with them and see if they have it so that we obviously don't send a caregiver to someone's house that might be positive. So we're taking a lot of precautions and our caregivers are going to clients' home with all the precautions and making sure that they're following CDC guidelines.

Great, thank you so much. And let me ask this, there's obviously been a couple of things, Mags, that I've gleaned during the course of our discussion that I think make you unique, but, You know, with options out there on in-home healthcare, in-home care, what, you know, as you look at Seniors First Home Care, what do you think are some of the unique aspects about your offerings to help people that are trying to make a decision and, and, and who may be interested in reaching out to you?

Yeah, so, um, I think what makes us unique as a home care agency is that, um, We have staff here that have healthcare backgrounds. So we have physicians, nurses, and other clinicians as part of our dedicated team. And, you know, those, those staff members have a lot of experience when it comes to dealing with patients with dementia, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and any other chronic diseases. So that, I think, differentiates us from other home care agencies. Not a lot of them have staff members with healthcare backgrounds. And we provide extensive training to our staff in all of those areas to make sure that they're adequately trained before we send them to someone's home. Like I said, we wanna make sure that we advocate for aging in place. We wanna keep seniors in the comfort of their home for as long as possible. So in order to do that, we develop what I called before the assessment, the personal care assessment for each client. And what we do is provide a plan of care that is designed to meet or exceed the recovery goals of a particular client.

Great. And I think you mentioned before, and I may have misunderstood, even the fact that you're licensed, bonded, and insured, it could be unique when you're looking at different options. Is that accurate?

That is accurate, yes. So we are a home care agency that obviously, unlike the nursing registry, We are licensed, bonded, and insured. And so when we are sending our caregivers to clients' homes, they have had a lot of training before we send them out. And they're employed by us. So that's the other difference is that we're not just sending anybody to any client's house. The client that we match with the caregiver, we go to a lot of training before we send someone. Because we want to make sure that, you know, obviously if we are going to be sending someone to someone's house that, you know, they have had the appropriate training, whether it's, you know, the diet requirement that someone may have. You know, if someone has diabetes or high blood pressure or heart failure, you know, how are you interacting with that person on a day-to-day basis? So really what we're trying to do right now and more than ever is, you know, trying to avoid hospital readmissions for a lot of our seniors. We don't want anyone to be going to a hospital. And so what we do is we have our staff who go through a lot of training in making sure that we're sending the right caregiver to that client's home.

Oh, great. We talked before we came on live, but I want to make sure we share it for the people that are on live. Geographically, your services cover what geographic area, Mags?

Yeah, so it's the Southwest Florida, but our office is located in Bonita Springs, and so we, we service the, the cities of Naples, um, and Bonita, Fort Myers, uh, Immokalee. So we are in the, in this geographical area, but we can extend all the way to the north, all the way to Port Charlotte if we need to.

That's great. I, I didn't— I'm catching you off guard a little bit here, but I'd love, you know, I'm thinking through questions people may have, and I'd love, as a, as a provider in this space, if you were having to make decisions for your family and you weren't in the role you're in, what 2 to 3 questions do you think are the most important ones for people to ask as they're trying to decide, is Seniors First Home Care the right provider for me? Is it a different scenario altogether? Again, for the audience, She was not anticipating this question, but you've inspired me to think about how would someone make that decision? What are questions you think are worth asking?

Yeah, so I think that right now, a lot of people are concerned about obviously the COVID-19. So I think, and this is a question that we do get a lot, is what precautions are you currently taking before you're sending some caregivers to clients' homes. If I had someone coming to my house, I'd like to make sure that they're taking all the necessary precautions. So I think we answered some of that question, but again, I just want to reinforce that we are taking all the necessary precautions. So I think that's one of the questions that people may have. The other thing is, what training do you provide to your caregivers? Are they Are they trained in different areas? Can they look after the elderly who may have Alzheimer's or dementia? And are you able to look after them? And lastly, I think, and you did ask this question, Renee, is do you provide medical assistance? Because I think some people, when they think of home care, sometimes they don't always understand that the difference between non-skilled and skilled. So again, I just want to remind the audience that we are non-skilled, but Having said that, you know, we remind, you know, our clients to take their medications and, you know, help them with whatever diet that they might be on so our caregivers can make sure that, you know, they can cook the appropriate meals for them.

Great. And Mags, I'm going to pause for just a moment before we wrap up. I want to encourage people and talk about tomorrow. I've got my last one for the week. I've got I Want that yummy. I'm gonna have to make sure that I eat breakfast before I talk to her tomorrow. We were doing it at 8 in the morning again as more people are starting to return to work. I've been trying to do these earlier in the morning in a hope that we catch people as the, you know, before they head out for their days, but certainly this is always available during replay. If we didn't catch you before you went out today, we thank you for coming back and watching later. So, Mags, tell me a little bit, you know, as we round out the half an hour here with a few moments left, I just wanted to open it up for anything you might want to share with our audience today that we either didn't want to cover or that you want to reemphasize.

Yeah. So again, I think the last thing I'd like to say is that if you are looking for home care, either for yourself or a loved one, you know, please give us a call. We'll be happy to help you find the resources that you, you may need. You know, you don't have to do this alone. You know, so if you think that home care might be an option for you, give us a call. If it's still not the best option, we'll be happy to help you, guide you in what is, what is the best care that you need. You know, lastly, I just want to say that in times like this, you know, we're, we're all in this together. And, you know, you don't have to do this alone. So give us a call.

Love it. Well, Mags, thank you for reaching out to me. I am so privileged and honored to have the opportunity to meet you and hear about your business. And again, thank you for everything you do for our community because you're, you're absolutely right up the right alley in terms of the need. It exists. It probably in some cases exists more in abundance than we even have the opportunity to to cover sometimes. So thank you for filling that need here in Southwest Florida.

Thank you.

And if you have a business or you know of a business that you'd like to have showcased on Connections in Southwest Florida, just have them reach out to me at Renee, R-E-N-E-E, at yournaplesexpert.com. I will say, if you FaceTime message me or any of that, please follow up with an email. My FaceTime gets so inundated with messages that there is a high likelihood that it will get buried and you won't hear back from me. And I can tell you that's not like me. If you, if you know anybody that knows me, they'll tell you one of my strengths and development needs is that I'm incredibly responsive. So please take a moment to send me an email if you have a business that you'd like to have showcased, and I'm happy to work with you on that. So, Mags, I hope you have a fantastic rest of the day as we move into the weekend. And again, thank you for your time and your service and passion.

Thank you so much, Renee, and thanks to everyone who's watching out there. I look forward to speaking with you. Thank you.

Have a wonderful weekend, everybody.

Thanks, you too, Renee. Bye-bye.