Ms. Zhang Shu-lan, who grew up in Dongqing Village (Dongqing Tribe), has dedicated herself to nursing work. She received a notice from Lanyu Township Public Health Center, instructing her to undergo home care training in Taiwan. After completing the training, Ms. Zhang returned to the Lanyu Township Public Health Center and began promoting the Home Care Program, though she harbored some concerns and worries.

Based on her previous nursing experience, patients in serious condition were typically sent to Taiwan. Those applying for home care had to meet certain conditions, such as using a urinary catheter, nasogastric tube, or tracheotomy. However, during her visits to all the tribes in Lanyu, she discovered many souls still in need of help. She was shocked to learn that the island has many cancer patients and solitary elderly individuals who require more daily necessities and additional care personnel.

She began seeking volunteers and crowdfunding; however, since the township public health center is a public organization that can't handle donated necessities, she took advances from a friend and established "Lanyu Home Care Association" with volunteers and young people of Lanyu, contributing efforts to their island.

Introduced Resources from the Ministry of Labor to Train New Employees
In the early days of the association, Ms. Zhang and her friends took on various administrative tasks such as organizing rules, preparing material lists, and recording donation details. As more volunteers joined the association, they helped share the workload. Since 2023, the association has been working to implement the subsistence program from the public sector and has provided permanent job opportunities, allowing volunteers to earn some income. "The Social Type of Multi-Employment Promotion Program by the Ministry of Labor" is one of the programs it has applied for.

Ms. Zhong Xiu-zhen from Pingtung County is the program manager. She returned to Lanyu with her husband and gradually adapted to life in Dongqing Village after being unfamiliar at first. "People who applied for our positions mostly need income. The government subsidies indeed improved the economic situation of the staff's households, which matched the corn mission of the Social Type Program: Enhance social welfare, and promote employment," she said happily.

However, Ms. Zhong still has one concern: "We hope to have young people join the home caregiver position. Since most elderly individuals can only listen to and speak the tribal Tao language, and the young generation is not familiar with it and aware of their needs, most home caregivers are from the young adult generation."

Home Caregivers Visit and Deliver Meals and Walk Through the Entire Lanyu Island
The daily routine of home caregivers focuses on meal delivery and home visits. They provide fresh-cooked lunch meals to each case's home. Every Friday, they deliver the Friday meal along with the supplementary Saturday meal (bread or cookies). On Sunday, all the meals are first sorted at a volunteer's home, then the volunteers deliver them to each recipient's case. Although they only provide lunch meals to the cases, some poor households only have lunch for one day. The home caregivers also conduct home visitations every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday; The entire Lanyu Island area is covered.

The project employee, Ms. Guo Ya-li, emphasized the importance of home visitation. She said, "Through home visitation, we understand the needs and mental conditions of each case. We can observe the slightest changes in them, even when we meet them daily." Ms. Zhong Xiu-zhen added that "Thanks to the partners who notice the daily lives of the cases, we can reduce sudden incidents from occurring."

With the help of the Multi-Employment Promotion Program, the shortage of long-term and home caregivers has improved. So far, the Association has trained 5 to 6 project employees as home caregivers for the association, or they have transferred to other jobs.

Arrange Empowerment Courses, Learning How to Care for People, and Make Coffee
For the working partners who work hard every day to serve the cases, the Association provides them the empowerment courses that focus on daily care, spiritual classes, hospice care, and understanding hospice care. Ms. Zhong Xiu-zhen mentions that in order to add richness to the courses, she also asks the café operators on the Island to give her partners coffee classes during off-pick season. During the gap in joining the diversified courses in Taiwan, Ms. Zhong Xiu-zhen also contacted with the well-known Pingtung Taiwu Coffee Production Cooperatives, hoping that her Lanyu partners could go to Pingtung (which is on Taiwan island) for learning different skills.

"All the invited lecturers or organizations are willing to give training courses to us. They are just waiting for our decision about the date of the course and the personnel deployment because our daily work cannot be interrupted." Ms. Zhong has her reasons for the advanced deployment. The "Hope Healing Garden" next to the association is the brainchild of the association's founder, Ms. Zhang Shu-lan. It was completed and put into use on August 3, 2024. It is mainly a multi-care space for critically ill patients and their families to breathe and release stress. It also practices its visions in peace and well-planning of the life process. Among the Garden's plan, Ms. Zhong arranges a bar area that can make bakery and coffee beverages, which will be arranged for the employees of the Multi-Employment Promotion Program.

Standing by the coast, the association silently guards the residents of Lanyu Island and gives the people warmth and hope. Although the association has raised funding or received donations from kind people. However, Ms. Zhong hopes to transform the recent program to the "Economic Type of Multi-Employment Promotion Program," for other income sources. However, since the Association is a non-profit organization, it needs more time to draw the future plan. She hopes the association can upgrade the quality of the home care service and provide better salaries to its employees.
Official Facebook Page of Lanyu Home Care Association

▲A Japanese magician, Mr. Kura, came to Lanyu Island to play magic and have fun with the elderly. (Provided by Lanyu Home Care Association)

▲The hard work is visible; Ms. Zhong Xiu-zhen, the project manager, won the 2023 Community Care Site Feature Award. (Photo by Lisin Icyang)

▲ The newly opened "Hope Healing Garden" is a multi-dimensional care space that offers stress relief for patients and their families. (Photo by Lisin Icyang)

▲The capable partners who are busy with home care every day. (Provided by Lanyu Home Care Association)
 

Case Story: Multi-Employment Promotion Program
Interviewee: Lanyu Home Care Association

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Please attribute this article to“Workforce Development Agency, Ministry of Labor.”