Jan 01, 2024
BOSTON, MA – Evan Falchuk, CEO of Family First, the leading provider of caregiving solutions for families, employers and insurers, has announced his predictions of the important trends, events and impacts surrounding the caregiver crisis in 2024.
“Roughly three-quarters of Americans today are acting as caregivers, creating challenges for families, the government, and our economy that are increasingly hard to ignore,” said Falchuk. “While these challenges are enormous, there are some tremendous opportunities to make a real impact on this growing crisis.”
Falchuk added he expects “big things to happen” in the coming year, including:- Caregiving solutions will become a top focus for employers. Nearly 75% of employees report balancing caregiving responsibilities with work, including employees in the “sandwich” generation caring for parents and children simultaneously. Employers face increased bottom-line costs from increased absenteeism, disability, and leave, reduced retention and productivity, increased healthcare costs, and reduced job satisfaction and well-being. As a result, more employers will prioritize solutions for these caregivers to improve their bottom line.
- Caregivers will face more financial strain than ever. By the end of 2024, the amount of money families spend on the care needs of their loved ones will reach record levels. Data from 2023 shows that family caregivers spend more than 25% of their annual income on caregiving costs.
- More Medicare Advantage plans will commit themselves to supporting caregivers in meaningful ways. Quality measures will be increasingly important drivers of sales of MA plans in 2024. With nearly half of MA insureds either actively caring for a loved one or being cared for by a caregiver, there is a tremendous opportunity to support these caregivers in ways that improve the quality of care, drive awareness of other benefits available to the member, and meaningfully improve the member experience.
- The risks of leveraging untrained, unaccredited professionals to deliver healthcare solutions and services will be exposed. Healthcare solutions should never be delivered by unaccredited professionals, but this kind of business model has become more common than ever. Terrible impacts occur when these models are delivered at scale, as in the case of the Papa, Inc. scandal. Given the large number of businesses using unaccredited professionals to provide healthcare services, unfortunately, there will be more of these stories in 2024.
- President Biden will mention caregiving during his State of the Union address. 2024 will kick off with President Biden discussing the importance of supporting caregivers while touting his administration’s 2022 National Strategy to Support Family Caregivers. While the trouble in getting bills passed in Congress and the reality of an election year may make it difficult to take major new action as part of the 2022 Strategy, there will noticeable action across federal agencies to do more to help family caregivers.
