Health at Home Services

Home care is non-medical help with daily life: bathing, dressing, meals, housekeeping and companionship, paid privately. Home health care is skilled clinical care ordered by a physician. Health at Home provides both.

That matters because needs move. A client who starts with Medicare-covered nursing after a hospital stay often still needs daily help once those visits end. One agency covering both means the care plan carries over instead of the family starting again with someone new.

Care is billed hourly at $30 to $40 depending on the level of care, including nights and weekends. Shifts are a minimum of four hours on any day care is scheduled. Only major holidays carry a higher rate.

Two things move a care plan: whether transfers require two people, and how clinically complex the care is. For most families the meaningful comparison is not another agency but an assisted living or memory care facility, and the comparison table on our costs page sets that out side by side.

No. Private duty home care needs no physician order and no referral. Call, and we schedule a free in-home assessment with a nurse. Care can start within 24 hours.

Medicare-certified home health is the exception. That does require a physician order and a homebound determination, and it is usually set up by a hospital discharge planner. The two can run side by side, and often do.

They are W-2 employees of Health at Home, not registry contractors. We carry the payroll taxes, workers compensation and liability, we run the background checks, and we supervise the work.

The practical difference shows up on a bad day. With a registry the family is the employer, so a 6am call-out is the family’s problem to solve and the liability is theirs. With an agency the shift is ours to cover. Caregivers wear branded uniforms and clock in by GPS with dual signatures on every visit.

Within 24 hours in most cases. The first step is a free in-home evaluation by a nurse, who builds the care plan and matches a caregiver to it.

Hospital and rehab discharges are the most common urgent start and we staff them regularly. If a discharge date is already set, call before it rather than after. The assessment and the caregiver match are easier to do while the client is still in the facility.

Medicare pays for skilled home health when a physician orders it and the patient is homebound with an intermittent skilled need. It does not pay for ongoing personal care or companionship, which is most of what home care is.

That portion is private pay, though it is often paid at least partly from a long-term care insurance policy or VA Aid and Attendance for eligible veterans and surviving spouses. We go through which of those may apply at the free assessment.

No. Health at Home is a private pay agency and does not bill Florida Medicaid. Care is paid privately, and often at least partly from a long-term care insurance policy or VA Aid and Attendance for eligible veterans and surviving spouses.

If care will be funded through Medicaid, Florida’s Choice Counseling line at 1-877-711-3662 can direct you to a participating provider. We would rather tell you that now than at the end of an assessment.

Palm Beach and Broward from our Boynton Beach office at (561) 806-7027, and St. Lucie, Martin and Indian River from our Port St. Lucie office at (772) 288-7386.

Both offices are licensed by the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration, Medicare certified and ACHC accredited. Calls route to one intake team regardless of which number you dial, so you will not be transferred between branches to get an answer.