Nine Years of Service (Part 2 of 3)

This month, our company celebrates nine years in business. As a founding partner of Elder Care Guides, I've enjoyed this opportunity to reflect on how far we've come, and how much we've accomplished for and with our clients. In this series of posts, I recount nine of my favorite memories from my first nine years as a part of this company:

4) In 2007, Susan Valoff (who was then a colleague working at another local care management agency) and I co-chaired a committee that planned the annual educational conference of the Western Regional Chapter of the National Association of Professional Geriatric Care Managers (NAPGCM). To do so, we enlisted the help of several of our local care manager colleagues, providing many of us with our first opportunities to get to know one another. From this very positive experience of working together, we formed the local unit of NAPGCM, which continues to meet six times per year for professional education and collaboration. I'm deeply proud to work in an industry that is collaborative, rather than competitive, at its core. (Not to mention that just a few years later, Susan would join our team at Elder Care Guides, becoming a partner in the business and the foundation of our great clinical team.)

5) In 2008, we moved from our humble home office beginnings into a beautiful leased office space in Liberty Station. Our office in Historic Building 28 is a set of restored barracks, built when this property was the Naval Training Center (NTC). It was an area of San Diego that is full of historical importance, and personal memories for our clients (many of whom were WWII veterans), and their families.

6) Three years ago, one of our caregiver employees received the award for Outstanding Home Care Service from the California Association of Health Services at Home (CAHSAH). The award is given in Sacramento annually to an individual who is "directly involved in day-to-day care and has consistently provided outstanding service to patients in their homes." An employee of Elder Care Guides since 2004, today she continues to embody our philosophy of client-centered care.