24-Hour Home Care Offering
Around The Clock Support

24-hour care means caregivers work in rotating shifts and someone is awake and on duty at all hours. Live-in care means one caregiver stays in the home and sleeps there overnight. Health at Home provides shift care.

The difference matters most at night. A live-in caregiver has to sleep, so anything that happens between roughly 10pm and 6am depends on the client waking them. For someone who wanders, gets up to the bathroom unassisted, needs repositioning, or becomes confused in the evening, an awake caregiver is the safer arrangement rather than the more expensive one.

24-hour care is billed at the same hourly rate as any other shift, $30 to $40 depending on the level of care, including nights and weekends. What changes the weekly cost is how many days you need covered.

Two things can 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 a memory care or skilled nursing facility, and the comparison table on our costs page sets that out side by side.

Because of the hours involved, 24-hour care is often paid at least partly from a long-term care insurance policy, VA Aid and Attendance, or a Florida Medicaid long-term care program rather than entirely out of pocket. We go through which of those you may qualify for at the free in-home assessment.

Yes. Under 24-hour shift care a caregiver is awake and on duty through the night. Nobody sleeps on shift, which is the main difference between shift care and live-in care.

Overnight is not a quiet shift. It covers toileting, repositioning to prevent pressure injuries, responding to sundowning and confusion, medication reminders on an overnight schedule, and noticing changes in breathing or alertness that a family member asleep down the hall would miss.

A 24-hour schedule is covered by a small consistent team rather than one person, because no caregiver can safely work around the clock. We keep the same caregivers on a case wherever scheduling allows.

Consistency matters clinically, not just socially. A caregiver who has been with a client for weeks notices the change in gait, appetite or alertness that a first-time caregiver has no baseline for. When we do have to introduce someone new, they are briefed on the care plan before the first shift.

We staff the replacement. Finding coverage is the agency responsibility, not the family. A scheduling coordinator fills the shift from our own caregiver pool.

This is the clearest practical difference between an agency and a registry. With a registry, the family is the employer, so a 6am call-out is the family problem to solve. With an agency, the shift is ours to cover, and the client keeps continuous care.

No. Medicare does not cover 24-hour or continuous care at home. Medicare may cover intermittent skilled home health visits when a physician orders them and coverage criteria are met, which is a different service.

24-hour care is typically paid privately, through a long-term care insurance policy, through VA Aid and Attendance for eligible veterans and surviving spouses, or through a Florida Medicaid long-term care program for those who qualify. If you are not sure which applies, we can walk through the options at the assessment.

Yes. Many families start with a few four-hour shifts a week after a hospital or rehab discharge and add hours as they see what is actually needed. Care plans are adjusted, not fixed at signing.

It often works the other way too. A client who comes home after a hip replacement may need heavy coverage for two weeks and much less by week six. The care plan is reviewed by an RN and changed as the situation changes.

Yes. Health at Home provides 24-hour home care across Palm Beach, Broward, Martin, St. Lucie and Indian River counties. Care can start within 24 hours.