Home healthcare firms hiring thousands as Covid pushes demand for nurses and caretakers

Home healthcare companies are ramping up hiring of nurses and caretakers as demand for home-based care increases.

Companies like Portea, HealthCare at Home, India Home Health Care and Care24 are planning to increase their staff by 20-60% this fiscal year.

Industry players say that the second wave of Covid-19 helped drive acceptance of home-care. Favourable regulation from the Indian insurance regulator is also expected to give a further fillip to the segment.

While most of the home healthcare market is filled with small mom-and-pop “bureaus” that supply nurses and caretakers for patients at home, players like Portea and Care24 have brought about a greater degree of formalisation.

According to a November 2020 report by RedSeer Consulting, India's home healthcare market, valued at $5.4 billion, was set to reach $11-13 billion by 2025, growing at a compounded annual rate of 15-19%. The organised market, which is a small proportion of the overall market, is expected to expand at 40% and touch $300 million by 2025.

The home healthcare segment has more than doubled since last year, said Balasubramanian Anantha Narayana, business head (consumer and healthcare) at TeamLease Services. He said another 50% growth can be expected this year. At least 5,000 new jobs would be added in the organised market, said Narayana.

Vaibhav Tewari, cofounder of Portea, said overall demand for homecare has gone up by around 30-40% in the last year. While demand had reduced during the lockdown last year as travel was an issue and people were wary of discretionary spending like on home-care, it bounced back during the second wave. The company, which has about 4,000 staff, plans to increase this number by 1,500-2,000 people, mostly nurses, physiotherapists, nursing attendants and caretakers.

Experts estimate that at least 1 million people are employed in home healthcare. Portea’s Tewari said that about 10% of these would be nurses, while about 5% would be physiotherapists. Another 15-20% are those taking care of new mothers and babies, and the rest are caretakers or ayahs. Doctors also work in home healthcare, but they are not full-time employees.

Industry players say the second wave of Covid in particular gave a huge push to home healthcare. During that time, hospital beds had run out in many cities due to which many patients had to be treated at home. This has brought about confidence that even critical illnesses can be treated successfully at home.

HealthCare atHome, which has about 1,000 employees, will add another 500-1,000 in the coming year, chief executive Vivek Srivastava said.

Meanwhile, attrition remains an issue with companies, as many nurses are keen on going abroad and there's a shortage of nurses in the country, although companies said the situation is expected to ease up in a couple of years.

India Home Health Care, which has around 800 staff, plans to add another 400 by FY22, according to CEO JM Vishwanath. He said during the Covid second wave, salaries of nurses had gone up. Customers too were willing to pay more.

Care24, which operates on an aggregator model and doesn’t directly employ home healthcare staff, has about 1,000 people on its platform, a drop from 2,000-odd people it had pre-Covid, said cofounder Garima Tripathi. However, this number is going up and the company expects an addition of 1,500-2,000 people in a year.