The evolving role of health care aides in the long-term care and home and community care sectors in Canada

Health Care Aides (HCAs) provide up to 80% of the direct care to older Canadians living in long term care facilities, or in their homes. They are an understudied workforce, and calls for health human resources strategies relating to these workers are, we feel, precipitous. First, we need a better understanding of the nature and scope of their work, and of the factors that shape it. Here, we discuss the evolving role of HCAs and the factors that …