A sick-child dilemma
Working parents have lost some day-care options, so they have to get creative
By Terri Yablonsky StatPublished October 30, 2005 - Chicago Tribune
What's worse than hearing your alarm clock ring on a Monday morning? For many working parents, it's the sniffles of a sick child.
A decade ago, salvation was a hospital-based center for sick-child day care, but these centers are gasping their last breath in Chicago. With high costs, liability issues and the seasonal nature of kids getting sick, more and more have closed. So, too, have stand-alone and day-care-based centers for sick kids.
Yet workplace absenteeism due to sick children is a significant problem, said Dr. Jacqueline W. Stewart, a pediatrician in Birmingham, Ala., and president of the National Association of Sick Child Day Care. Each day more than 350,000 children younger than 14 with both parents working are too sick to attend school or child care, according to association statistics. Working mothers (still the ones more often affected) miss work 5 to 29 days per year caring for sick children, costing employers $2 billion to $12 billion annually.
If you don't have the luxury of working from home, what do you do?
Many corporations are establishing back-up or emergency child-care funds, according to Mary Ellen Gornick, senior vice president for work-life consulting at Work-Life Benefits in Chicago. For example, employers may decide to give each employee $50 a day for six days of subsidized child care each year. This money can help pay for outside caregivers or company-identified back-up providers. Outside providers may include neighbors or friends or an agency-sponsored nanny who cares for mildly ill kids in the home, Gornick said.
Advocate Lutheran General Hospital's Children's Day Care in Des Plaines, which serves nearly 500 kids a day, considered offering sick-child care several times but decided against it.
"Surveys indicate that parents would use it, but that doesn't translate to commitments," said Josie Disterhoft, director of Lutheran General's day care. "Unfortunately, you need to plan for it and commit to space."
Instead, for its employees, Lutheran General relies on staff flexibility and understanding managers. Employees often work in teams, so co-workers cover for one another when a child is sick. "Hopefully, the other person returns the favor," Disterhoft said. "It's lovely when it works among the team." Lutheran General also has a generous policy on paid time off, she said.
Dr. Leslie Brookfield, and her husband, Dr. Arbey Stone, of Deerfield used to scramble when one of their two children got sick and couldn't attend day care at Lutheran General, where both parents practice.
"We would hodgepodge together whatever we could," Brookfield said. "You take a half-day, I take half a day. We would get their grandmother to come from 60 miles away. One time I had a total stranger take care of them, a nice lady I met."When her children were around 4, Brookfield, a cardiologist, would take them to work with her when they were sick. They would watch videos in her office on a VCR she uses for reading echocardiograms.
In May, Allstate Insurance Co. in Northbrook instituted another option by offering a back-up care locator service for child and elder care. "Our 2004 annual survey of employees told us that child-care and elder-care issues are on the rise for our employees, so we worked with a vendor to develop a Web-based back-up care locator," said Anise Wiley-Little, director of diversity and work life at Allstate. Employees can use the tool to search their communities for sick-child caregivers to work inside or outside the home.Abbott Laboratories in north suburban Abbott Park offers employees the flexibility to telecommute when a child is sick, said Julie Ferguson, Abbott spokeswoman. The company also has a resource and referral service that provides employees with a list of care providers.For someone in a small company with limited resources, Disterhoft recommends building a support network of family, neighbors and colleagues to offer sick-child care in a pinch."People are generally quite generous," she said. Employees need to establish these relationships before Junior is running a fever, however.
Stewart suggests changing office policy. "Parents should go to their employer's human-resources department and demand sick-child care because if there is no voice, the employer thinks they can get away with it. But if there is enough demand, they have to provide it," Stewart said.
"We have seen that for every dollar a company spends on sick-child care, the company saves at least $3.50 in lost productivity," Stewart said. The average child is sick six days per year. Most companies offer family medical leave, personal leave or sick leave for employees or their families.
Stewart opened Hugs and Kisses, a stand-alone sick-child facility in Birmingham, in 1990 because her patients' parents were saying, "If my kid has one more ear infection, I will lose my job," she said. She owns two Hugs and Kisses, one open to the public and one for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama.
One of the few remaining hospitals in the Chicago area providing sick-child day care is Little Company of Mary in Evergreen Park. At the Care Depot, sick kids get their own patient room and are cared for by nurses. Parents must call ahead to check on room availability and staffing. Children are offered breakfast, lunch or dinner. The cost is $4 per hour for the public, $2 per hour for employees. Call 708-229-5393.
Denise Stillman, director of public relations and marketing at Little Company of Mary, took her 6-year-old daughter, Claire, to the Care Depot recently with the stomach flu. Claire watched TV and played video games. "It gave me peace of mind because I could not find a baby-sitter when she was vomiting at 6 a.m.," Stillman said. "She loves it. They take her temperature and give her Popsicles."
And it can be a pleasure for a harried parent too.Action for Children, referral service for child care in Cook County, www.daycareaction.org, 773-687-4000; National Association for Sick Child Daycare, www.nascd.com, 205-324-8447; Child Care Aware, www.childcareaware.org/en, 800-424-2246.
----------On the radioWould you let your kid go to sick-child day care? Tell Kathy and Judy between 9 a.m. and noon Monday on WGN-AM 720.
By Terri Yablonsky StatPublished October 30, 2005 - Chicago Tribune
What's worse than hearing your alarm clock ring on a Monday morning? For many working parents, it's the sniffles of a sick child.
A decade ago, salvation was a hospital-based center for sick-child day care, but these centers are gasping their last breath in Chicago. With high costs, liability issues and the seasonal nature of kids getting sick, more and more have closed. So, too, have stand-alone and day-care-based centers for sick kids.
Yet workplace absenteeism due to sick children is a significant problem, said Dr. Jacqueline W. Stewart, a pediatrician in Birmingham, Ala., and president of the National Association of Sick Child Day Care. Each day more than 350,000 children younger than 14 with both parents working are too sick to attend school or child care, according to association statistics. Working mothers (still the ones more often affected) miss work 5 to 29 days per year caring for sick children, costing employers $2 billion to $12 billion annually.
If you don't have the luxury of working from home, what do you do?
Many corporations are establishing back-up or emergency child-care funds, according to Mary Ellen Gornick, senior vice president for work-life consulting at Work-Life Benefits in Chicago. For example, employers may decide to give each employee $50 a day for six days of subsidized child care each year. This money can help pay for outside caregivers or company-identified back-up providers. Outside providers may include neighbors or friends or an agency-sponsored nanny who cares for mildly ill kids in the home, Gornick said.
Advocate Lutheran General Hospital's Children's Day Care in Des Plaines, which serves nearly 500 kids a day, considered offering sick-child care several times but decided against it.
"Surveys indicate that parents would use it, but that doesn't translate to commitments," said Josie Disterhoft, director of Lutheran General's day care. "Unfortunately, you need to plan for it and commit to space."
Instead, for its employees, Lutheran General relies on staff flexibility and understanding managers. Employees often work in teams, so co-workers cover for one another when a child is sick. "Hopefully, the other person returns the favor," Disterhoft said. "It's lovely when it works among the team." Lutheran General also has a generous policy on paid time off, she said.
Dr. Leslie Brookfield, and her husband, Dr. Arbey Stone, of Deerfield used to scramble when one of their two children got sick and couldn't attend day care at Lutheran General, where both parents practice.
"We would hodgepodge together whatever we could," Brookfield said. "You take a half-day, I take half a day. We would get their grandmother to come from 60 miles away. One time I had a total stranger take care of them, a nice lady I met."When her children were around 4, Brookfield, a cardiologist, would take them to work with her when they were sick. They would watch videos in her office on a VCR she uses for reading echocardiograms.
In May, Allstate Insurance Co. in Northbrook instituted another option by offering a back-up care locator service for child and elder care. "Our 2004 annual survey of employees told us that child-care and elder-care issues are on the rise for our employees, so we worked with a vendor to develop a Web-based back-up care locator," said Anise Wiley-Little, director of diversity and work life at Allstate. Employees can use the tool to search their communities for sick-child caregivers to work inside or outside the home.Abbott Laboratories in north suburban Abbott Park offers employees the flexibility to telecommute when a child is sick, said Julie Ferguson, Abbott spokeswoman. The company also has a resource and referral service that provides employees with a list of care providers.For someone in a small company with limited resources, Disterhoft recommends building a support network of family, neighbors and colleagues to offer sick-child care in a pinch."People are generally quite generous," she said. Employees need to establish these relationships before Junior is running a fever, however.
Stewart suggests changing office policy. "Parents should go to their employer's human-resources department and demand sick-child care because if there is no voice, the employer thinks they can get away with it. But if there is enough demand, they have to provide it," Stewart said.
"We have seen that for every dollar a company spends on sick-child care, the company saves at least $3.50 in lost productivity," Stewart said. The average child is sick six days per year. Most companies offer family medical leave, personal leave or sick leave for employees or their families.
Stewart opened Hugs and Kisses, a stand-alone sick-child facility in Birmingham, in 1990 because her patients' parents were saying, "If my kid has one more ear infection, I will lose my job," she said. She owns two Hugs and Kisses, one open to the public and one for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama.
One of the few remaining hospitals in the Chicago area providing sick-child day care is Little Company of Mary in Evergreen Park. At the Care Depot, sick kids get their own patient room and are cared for by nurses. Parents must call ahead to check on room availability and staffing. Children are offered breakfast, lunch or dinner. The cost is $4 per hour for the public, $2 per hour for employees. Call 708-229-5393.
Denise Stillman, director of public relations and marketing at Little Company of Mary, took her 6-year-old daughter, Claire, to the Care Depot recently with the stomach flu. Claire watched TV and played video games. "It gave me peace of mind because I could not find a baby-sitter when she was vomiting at 6 a.m.," Stillman said. "She loves it. They take her temperature and give her Popsicles."
And it can be a pleasure for a harried parent too.Action for Children, referral service for child care in Cook County, www.daycareaction.org, 773-687-4000; National Association for Sick Child Daycare, www.nascd.com, 205-324-8447; Child Care Aware, www.childcareaware.org/en, 800-424-2246.
----------On the radioWould you let your kid go to sick-child day care? Tell Kathy and Judy between 9 a.m. and noon Monday on WGN-AM 720.
Comments
This article just echo the previous one - "What's a modern girl to do?". We got to shoulder all this duties since these never had been perceived as men's duty. But the problem is you can't function well in the corporate while you don't have enough sleep caring for the sick baby.
How sad, the reality is if modern girl wants to get married, she have to put aside some of her dreams...