A day in the life of a home care worker in England: A human factors systems perspective

Abstract

The delivery of home care in England is explored with respect to (a) the work system (b) the barriers that challenge worker performance, and most importantly (c) whether these barriers impact the quality and safety of the care received by older adults. Data were collected using surveys and interviews with home care workers (n = 11). The analysis used two validated Human Factors and Ergonomics (HFE) models to map the data which identified three key performance barriers; (1) time factors, (2) organisational practices, and (3) job design. Adaptive behaviour was identified as being routine to manage time barriers, which resulted in trade-offs between care outcomes (delivery), quality and safety standards and work-related quality of life. The findings make an important contribution to the limited research literature on home care work by highlighting the opportunity for an HFE systems perspective to provide a novel approach for both understanding home care and building better home care systems.

Keywords: Adaptation; Care quality; Complex systems; Home care; Resilience.