IHCA to cater to growing demand in caregiver industry

Wednesday, 25 June 2014 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

With the fast paced lifestyle of today, the present generation faces a dual challenge of caring for their children and sometimes their parents. Many such people desperately need the break a professional caregiver provides. By 2020, nearly 14 million people in the United States , including Canada will be over the age of 85, and 84% of them will want to continue living at home. To do that, more than half will need assistance with daily living activities. The best option therefore for most is home care, where a professional caregiver lives at the home to personally look after them. This has resulted in the caregiver business to become one of the hottest markets around including a huge market potential also opening up for child care and those with special needs.

With this situation in mind the International Health Care Academy (IHCA) was launched to offer The Live-In-Caregiver (LIC) Certificate program under the Canadian Guidelines on a full time basis and is accredited by TVEC (Tertiary Vocational Education Commission – SL. IHCA provides effective and efficient skills and development training along with dedicated, well qualified and experienced instructors who are trained to deliver an international standard of studies. The basic entry requirement for the LIC course is A/L’s or any person who has completed a college diploma after O/L’s with fluency in English. The duration of the entire program is eight months, of which six months is taught full time in-class and two months of on-the-job-training. At the completion of the program one is qualified to apply for a two year work permit in Canada which leads to permanent residency. Since the training is also globally recognised, a person could apply to other countries for positions in a similar capacity. Giving an overview of the course, IHCA Managing Director Prathib Thavarajah stated, “We are proud to be the first and only accredited academy in Sri Lanka to provide this kind of program on a full time basis, according to international standards. We provide the LIC certificate program which is a globally recognised qualification. Our lecturers are from Sri Lanka, Canada and the Philippines.They have the best experience, knowledge and qualification in the industry to deliver exceptional learning experience and proper training techniques. “The program consists of seven modules which are; Elder Care, Child Care, Care for people with Special needs, First Aid and Emergency, English and Basic French, Personality development and Home management, the two months On-Job-Training (OJT) is conducted at different locations such as Hospitals, Children’s homes, elder’s homes, special needs facilities, first aid training, hotels and restaurants. We have laboratories for Elder Care, Child Care, Special needs care and home management that are fully equipped with the state-of-the-art training equipments which are mostly imported from Canada.” More information on the courses can be gathered by logging on to www.ihcasrilanka.com. Outlining the key advantage a student will gain through the course, Thavarajah said, “On successful completion of this program, an individual would be eligible to work as a caregiver for a child, an elder or a special need person locally or in Canada, USA, UK, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, New Zealand, Australia and most Middle Eastern countries.” Explaining the potential for growth, Thavarajah said, “It is predicted that there will be a huge increase in the personal and home care aides job category. Hence this category is forecasted to be the second fastest-growing job group in the world over the next decade, where the demand for these jobs will outpace supply in a big way.” He added that “Our mission is to contribute to the health care industry by providing well trained, caring and knowledgeable individuals to the health sector.”