The Big Picture
Many people receive health care and support where they live or elsewhere in their community. The client’s home is the most common community setting.
Support workers have a central role in home care. Their work includes personal care and other supports that help clients with daily life.
Home care also brings different workplace challenges. Support workers often work alone, receive direction from different care providers, enter unfamiliar homes, and work closely with clients and families.
Look for Nova Scotia CCA Notes throughout this page for current provincial guidance.
Quick tip: Tap, click, or press Enter on any term with a dotted underline and an ⓘ icon to see its plain-English definition.
Start Here If You’re Overwhelmed
Focus on these core ideas:
- Community-based settings include clients’ homes, group homes, and retirement homes.
- The client’s home is the most common community setting.
- Home care support workers provide personal care, ADLs, child care, transportation, and home management.
- If another care provider asks you to do an unfamiliar task or one that agency policy does not allow, check with your supervisor before doing it.
- Keep professional boundaries even when you work closely with clients and families.
- Discuss home safety concerns with the client and your supervisor, and protect your own safety when working in unfamiliar environments.
Jump to:
Course Notes: Key Ideas You Need to Know
What Are Community-Based Settings?
Community-based settings are places in the community where people receive health care and support services.
Examples include:
- clients’ homes
- group homes
- retirement homes
The client’s home is the most common community setting.
Clients also live in their own houses or apartments, retirement homes, or group homes.
Community-Based Services
Community-based services are health care and support services provided in community settings.
Examples of organizations and programs that hire support workers include:
- home care agencies
- live-in facilities
- group homes and retirement residences
- day programs
- school boards
Schools, community health centres, and doctors’ offices also provide community-based services.
A Canadian health care trend is to reduce hospital costs while increasing resources for community-based services. Provincial and territorial health ministries have developed more community-based programs to help clients live longer and avoid hospitalization.
This growth in home-based and community-based programs has increased demand for support workers.
Group Homes
A group home is a live-in setting where a small number of people with physical or mental disabilities live together.
People living in a group home receive supervision, care, and support services.
Retirement Homes and Assisted Living
A retirement home supports older people who remain independently mobile and live independently while receiving hospitality services.
These services include:
- meals
- housekeeping
Some retirement homes offer additional services, including bathing, dressing, or medication management.
A retirement home is one type of assisted-living facility. Assisted-living facilities provide residents with their own apartments along with support services. The term supportive housing facility is also used for this type of setting.
Supporting Independence in Community Settings
Support workers sometimes help clients take part more fully in their communities.
They also teach practical skills such as:
- doing laundry
- grocery shopping
- managing money
- doing personal banking
- taking a bus
- applying for a job
Around-the-Clock and Respite Care
Some clients require care throughout the day and night. Families also have times when they are unable to stay with the client.
Support workers often provide care during:
- evenings
- nights
- weekends
Respite care provides temporary care for a person who needs a high level of support, care, and supervision. This gives the person’s usual caregivers a break from their duties.
The Support Worker’s Role in Home Care
Home care forms an important part of Canada’s health care system, and support workers have a central role in this type of care.
An estimate places support workers at 80% of the total hours worked by all home care workers.
Home care support workers provide a range of services, including:
- personal care
- ADLs
- child care
- transportation
- home management
Support workers work full-time, part-time, or casual schedules.
They must follow their agency’s policies and procedures. Some agencies offer further education, and many provide in-servicing to keep workers updated on new procedures.
Who Employs Home Care Support Workers?
Most support workers who work in private homes work for an agency.
Some clients or families employ support workers privately instead.
Working on Your Own
Home care often involves one-on-one work with a client.
Some support workers prefer the independence of home care. Others prefer the activity and routines of a facility setting.
A supervisor remains reachable by phone. At times, a support worker needs to use personal judgment to solve problems while working independently.
Nova Scotia CCA Note
Sorrentino’s Canadian Textbook for the Support Worker, 5th Edition explains that home care workers sometimes use their own judgment while working independently. In Nova Scotia, a CCA can work autonomously in an established care environment and make choices within an established care plan for established activities of daily living. (novascotiacca.ca)
That independence has limits. An employer defines the CCA’s scope of employment, which sets the job-specific roles, responsibilities, functions, and competencies for that workplace. Employer policies and procedures define how the CCA performs the work. A CCA must not act outside the Nova Scotia CCA Occupational Standards of Practice or the employer’s policies and procedures. If a person needs an intervention beyond the CCA’s training and capabilities, the CCA must contact the relevant health care provider. (novascotiacca.ca)
Why this matters in Nova Scotia: Working on your own does not mean working outside your role. Your decisions still stay within the established care plan, your scope of employment, and employer policies and procedures. (novascotiacca.ca)
Official source: Continuing Care Assistant Occupational Standards of Practice
Last checked: August 29, 2026
Flexible Work Assignments
Most employers expect support workers to arrange their work schedules around the client’s care needs.
Some employers also permit workers to arrange assigned shifts around personal commitments.
This creates more flexibility in home care scheduling.
Taking Direction From Different Health Care Providers
Home care support workers sometimes receive direction from more than one health care provider.
For example, a physiotherapist might visit during your shift and ask you to perform a task that your supervisor did not request.
Key fact: If the task is unfamiliar to you or agency policy does not allow it, always check with your supervisor before doing it.
Direction from another care provider does not remove the need to follow agency policy.
Maintaining Professional Boundaries
Home care often creates close working relationships with clients and families.
You should remain caring and compassionate while keeping a professional boundary.
It is never appropriate to become personally involved in:
- the client’s life decisions
- family relationships
Do not confuse professionalism and empathy with friendship.
Clients and families need your skills, services, and attention. Do not:
- discuss your personal problems
- ask clients or families for personal advice
- pry into their problems
- offer advice about their personal problems
Safety in the Client’s Home
A client’s home sometimes contains safety hazards.
Examples include:
- frayed electrical cords
- unsafe smoking practices
Safety: Discuss safety concerns with the client and your supervisor.
Supporting People in Distress
Clients and families sometimes experience intense emotional or physical distress.
They might experience:
- pain
- fear
- upset
- anger
They might also refuse to cooperate with care providers.
In palliative care, support workers need to remain strong and supportive around intense suffering and emotions.
When a client faces a life-threatening illness, the support worker also needs to feel comfortable with personal feelings and attitudes toward death.
Protecting Your Own Safety
Home care workers do not control the environments they enter.
Work sometimes involves:
- travelling to unfamiliar areas
- driving in hazardous weather
- entering unfamiliar homes
- facing abuse or violence
Safety: You must look out for your own safety in these situations.
Exam Clue Words
- Always: If a task from another health care provider is unfamiliar or agency policy does not allow it, check with your supervisor before doing it.
- Never: Becoming personally involved in a client’s life decisions or family relationships breaks professional boundaries.
- Do not: Share personal problems, ask clients for advice, pry into their problems, or offer personal advice.
- Must: Follow your agency’s policies and procedures when providing home care.
- Must: Look out for your own safety when working in unfamiliar home care environments.
Common Mix-Ups
| Wrong Idea | Better Idea |
|---|---|
| Professionalism and empathy mean friendship. | Be caring and compassionate while keeping a professional boundary. |
Fast Review
Focus on the facts that separate settings, duties, boundaries, and safety rules.
- Community-based settings provide health care and support services within the community.
- The client’s home is the most common community setting.
- A group home is a live-in setting where a small number of people with physical or mental disabilities live together and receive supervision, care, and support services.
- Retirement homes support independently mobile older people with services such as meals and housekeeping.
- A retirement home is one type of assisted-living facility.
- Support workers account for an estimated 80% of the total hours worked by all home care workers.
- Home care work includes personal care, ADLs, child care, transportation, and home management.
- Home care workers must follow agency policies and procedures.
- Check with your supervisor before performing an unfamiliar task or one agency policy does not allow.
- Keep professional boundaries with clients and families.
- Discuss hazards in the client’s home with the client and your supervisor.
- Protect your own safety when entering unfamiliar environments or facing hazards such as dangerous weather, abuse, or violence.
Final Pep Talk
This topic asks you to separate several settings, responsibilities, and workplace rules that look similar at first. Review them in small groups, especially professional boundaries, supervisor direction, and the two types of safety concerns.