Savanna Helped Her Grandmother Before Entering Senior-Care Field
Not long after Savanna Perdue earned her CNA from Surry Community College in Dobson, North Carolina, in November 2021, she joined Home Instead® of Mount Airy. It was Savanna’s first job in her field of study, but certainly not her first senior-care experience.
That experience came as a family caregiver four years earlier for the Orlando, Florida, native, and it was what some observers might call “a baptism by fire” because of the detailed care that was needed. Savanna recalled: “In 2017, my grandma was diagnosed with lung cancer. She was beset by a number of tumors and had only a few months to live, so she was placed in home hospice care.”
Savanna added: “All of my family took turns each night taking care of her and spending the entire evening with her because she stayed in the hospital bed that hospice gave her. She couldn’t walk and could hardly eat or speak.”
After choosing to enter CNA education, Savanna did her practical training in care communities and at the Northern Regional Hospital in Mount Airy. A friend who worked for Home Instead told Savanna about the 11-year-old company, where she applied. After joining Home Instead, she received the office staff’s orientation and training before beginning her first shift.
Savanna worked for the award-winning Home Instead franchise for about six months before Staff Coordinator Sharon Bledsoe announced Savanna had been honored as the Care Professional of the Month for May. Focusing on Home Instead’s training, and processes and procedures of successful caregiving helped Savanna achieve Care Pro of the Month status.
Savanna provides companionship, safety assurance, meal preparation, medication reminders, light housekeeping, and transportation and errands. She and other Home Instead Care Pros offer personal assistance with eating, grooming, dressing, bathing, incontinence care, dementia support, cognitive impairment, hospice support and mobility assistance. By expertly doing so, Care Pros not only assist their clients, but help their families eliminate worry, reduce stress and re-establish personal freedom.
“What I like most about my job,” Savanna said, “is that I get to help seniors with activities they can no longer to do for themselves. I also love hearing their stories and life experiences that span from their childhood to adulthood. They always make me feel at home, and they always make me feel as if they are one of my own grandparents.”
To date, Savanna’s most amazing client memory involves her current client, and a former client and a huge stroke of serendipity. Savanna learned they knew each other. They had grown up together, had gone to the same college, had taught at the same school and had gone to the same church. Savanna said: “That has been my favorite story because of the amazing coincidence it is to have two clients who knew each other well.”
Savanna loves being a part of the Care Pro team for the North Carolina franchise, a member of the highly successful Honor and Home Instead network. Van and Ann Lankford are the franchise’s co-owners. Honor is the world’s largest home care network with the most advanced care platform, revolutionizing how society cares for older adults, their families and Care Pros. Honor acquired Home Instead in 2021, and the combined company supports the work of more than 100,000 Care Pros across 13 countries and meets the growing needs of millions of older adults and their families worldwide.
All Home Instead Care Professionals are screened, trained, bonded and insured. For inquiries about employment, please call (336) 789-4472 or apply online. For further information about Home Instead, visit our website.
