Caregiving is in Tiffany McKinney’s blood. Serving as a family caregiver, Tiffany helped her aunt take care of Tiffany’s grandmother and an uncle. Then the unthinkable occurred – Tiffany’s aunt got sick. “When that happened,” Tiffany recalled, “I took care of her until she passed away in 2016.”
Of course, the ultimate in family caregiving is being a wife and mom, and Tiffany is proud to tell everyone about her family that includes two beautiful daughters. In reality, it’s a 24/7 job, but Tiffany embraces it. “I’ve been a stay-at-home mom for a very long time, but I knew I wanted to do more. I found the perfect job with Home Instead®,” said Tiffany, who joined Home Instead of Martinsburg on Oct. 29, 2020. The award-winning Home Instead franchise serves West Virginia’s Eastern Panhandle, including Tiffany’s city of Inwood.
“I found Home Instead on a job website,” she said, “and I immediately filled out an application. I knew I wanted to do something to help others and make them smile.”
Generating clients’ smiles is important, but professional caregiving is more than that. In addition to Tiffany’s strong companionship skills, she provides safety assurance, meal preparation, medication reminders, light housekeeping, and transportation and errands. Tiffany offers personal assistance with eating, grooming, dressing, bathing, incontinence care, cognitive impairment, hospice support and mobility. By doing so, Tiffany not only assists her clients, but helps their families eliminate worry, reduce stress and re-establish personal freedom.
For her skills and empathy, Tiffany recently was honored as one of Martinsburg’s Home Instead CAREGivers of the Month. Among the considerations for achieving CAREGiver of the Month status, an employee has shown he or she has gone above and beyond the call of duty, Martinsburg Office Supervisor Nina Eastham pointed out.
Compassion is taken into account for the award, as well as skill and wisdom for dealing with challenging situations. Tiffany embodies Home Instead’s guiding principles of “Build Trust, Take the Lead and Share Your Heart.” Tiffany is someone who is exceptional at her work with any client, Nina emphasized. Focusing on Home Instead’s training, processes and procedures of successful caregiving also helped Tiffany achieve the CAREGiver of the Month award.
Tiffany said: “What I like most about being a CAREGiver is seeing how happy the clients are to see me and how much they appreciate everything I do for them. My favorite stories are the ones about everywhere my clients have traveled, the different kinds of jobs they had and what they have accomplished. They are more than just clients. They become family.”
Tiffany loves being a part of the CAREGiver team for owner Keith Clay’s franchise, a member of a highly successful network founded in 1994 in Omaha, Nebraska. The Home Instead network is the world’s leading provider of in-home care services for older adults, with more than 1,200 independently owned and operated franchises that provide care throughout the United States and 13 other countries. Tiffany is among more than 100,000 CAREGivers worldwide.
