{"id":78518,"date":"2026-08-22T09:04:04","date_gmt":"2026-08-22T01:04:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=78518"},"modified":"2026-08-22T09:04:04","modified_gmt":"2026-08-22T01:04:04","slug":"caring-for-a-104kg-senior-alone-the-risks-when-domestic-workers-lack-caregiving-training","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=78518","title":{"rendered":"Caring for a 104kg senior alone \u2013 the risks when domestic workers lack caregiving training"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Ms Kate Cham, 36, recalled how her late grandfather, who was in an advanced stage of dementia and Parkinson&#8217;s disease, <span>was initially cared for by a domestic worker with basic caregiving knowledge.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>The bedbound senior <\/span>experienced &#8220;an improved level of care&#8221; after the family engaged someone with years of experience and training.<\/p>\n<p>Ms Cham, who is also co-founder of live-in helper and caregiver agency Anglo Caregivers, said: &#8220;On the first day, immediately she knew what to do \u2013 when to change diapers, how often to turn him, how to position him, how often to wet his mouth, how to do daily range-of-motion exercises to loosen his contractures.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The worker also quickly noticed Ms Cham&#8217;s grandfather having difficulty expelling phlegm due to his advanced-stage dementia and Parkinson&#8217;s disease, and suggested that the family consider suctioning the phlegm.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;She also started performing chest percussion for my grandfather to help him with loosening the phlegm without us prompting.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h2>WHY THE RIGHT MATCH CAN BE HARD TO FIND\u00a0<\/h2>\n<p>Filling the ever-growing demand for domestic workers who can perform caregiving roles can be challenging, employment agencies said.<\/p>\n<p>Ms Chloe Lim, co-founder and director of maid agency gentleHelp, said: &#8220;Helpers with relevant caregiving experience or formal training typically command a premium, in both one-off hiring costs and monthly salary, simply because that experience is harder to come by.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They&#8217;re also not easy to source, since migrant domestic workers with these skill sets often have other job opportunities as well, for instance, in the institutional care sector.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Families and observers said that some employers may be reluctant to have their helpers undergo training because of cost and time constraints.<\/p>\n<p>Others may underestimate the importance of training or finding the right fit, believing that the workers can simply learn on the job.<\/p>\n<p><span>Associate Professor <\/span>Kelvin Tan,<span> a gerontologist<\/span> at the Singapore University of Social Sciences (SUSS) <span>who studies ageing and the needs of older people, <\/span>said: &#8220;There is no &#8216;plug and play&#8217; for human-related services, and even more so for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.channelnewsasia.com\/singapore\/young-people-men-home-care-industry-4631551\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">caregiving<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Even experienced migrant domestic workers need refresher courses to keep up with the knowledge and be an improved version of themselves.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<center><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.channelnewsasia.com\/today\/ground-up\/domestic-worker-helper-maid-caregiver-training-elderly-senior-special-needs-6332566\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read Full Article At Source <\/a><br \/>\n<center\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ms Kate Cham, 36, recalled how her late grandfather, who was in an advanced stage of dementia and Parkinson&#8217;s disease, was initially cared for by&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":78519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2611],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-78518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-buzz-headlines","wpcat-2611-id"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=78518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78518\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/78519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=78518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=78518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=78518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}