coordinator

support worker

infirmier

préposé au service de soutien personnel

infirmier auxiliaire autorisé

ParaMed

Having spent some time employed here, The job itself is great.  There are good things about the job and some negative as well.

Staffing is atrocious.  If you are seeking employment pretty well guaranteed a position within company due to staff leaving the job, or as I like to call it, the revolving door.  Managers, coordinators, field staff.  Where my experience has been mostly pleasant and I've enjoyed as well as learned a great deal about both nursing and myself, you have a hard time blaming the people applying on the premise they cannot handle community.  I have been on a few teams for multiple years with 0 turn over and a wait list to apply, but hasn't been the case here.  Additionally, having to pick up slack from other nurses who are under qualified and lack the same skill set across the board as well as not being willing to learn can be a tad irritating.

The Management is really good at feigning concern for your well being and status within the field. (Example, Entire employment with this company. I'd say about 80%, no exaggeration, I would take on a lot more than other people in the field.  Work 7 days a week and very little down time.  Take on any case or task they needed handled etc.  0 sick days. Requesting vacation time you are required to give them minimum 6 months notice or you are denied, has happened on 3 different occasions I requested time off.).  The management team also seems to care more about making money than the general health and well being of their staff.  They are not paid to be our friends or family. However a general concern for staff working a staggering amount of hours would be amazing.  A positive,  If you need help with skills they help you, as long as you are able to make it to the office before 530pm when they leave for the day.

Coordination - They have coordinators who haven't a clue where townships are in the county, nor some streets in city are, yet they are responsible for scheduling.  I have had to argue where certain areas are vs others because they lack basic geographical knowledge and have sat on the phone forcing them to open a map to physically look and see where things are.  Coordinators will overload you with a case load to a point you are racing from person to person bordering on breaking traffic violations to reach that person because they leave certain visits unfilled until the last possible minute without regard to your case load, working shift, or travel time between each person seen.

Assignments - Management has several staff working areas they do not live.  Some yes, some no.  There are some staff that have to travel from one end of the city to the other or one end of the county to the other. Some prefer the distance to their general working area, some have been pigeon toed Into taking on a position in a specific area.  There are times where coordinators and the management team will try to force you into working beyond your scheduled shift.

Breaks and downtime - There is no set time for breaks or lunch.  Field staff are able to take a break as needed or when appropriate, however certain caseloads and time required to see people within your set shift, often does not include time for a meal.  My lunches consist of finger foods I am able to eat while driving between clients.  Downtime exists only when your shift is over.

While this review is listed mainly negative, and comes across as a cry fest, this really is a decent job.  Union, benefits, nurses are making 19 and change.  Psw make 16.50.  You work alone and do not have to deal with inter workplace drama and hassles.  The people we see are generally good, with a few bad apples but that is normal for any group of people.  We also have the option of working at different companies if we dislike our position that much.  There is no slander or malicious intent on this review, but rather an honest review that can be verified by any current or former employee.

For a final comment, I leave you with this. If you are looking for a job and willing to take anything this company can be perfect for you.  You will learn a lot and it will help you grow. This is not a career company but rather a stepping stone onto something better.  And with the staggering number of employees, in and out, and fortune spent training these people.  Rest assured you too could have a position with Paramed Home Healthcare.  A personal tip? Do not apply through their website, go into the office and speak to a supervisor.

Working as a coordinator is incredibly stressful and fast paced. If you are good at your job, they will continue to pile extra work on you until you reach your breaking point. I have seen almost all of my coworkers cry due to stress at least once. There is so much miscommunication between coordination, management, clients and field staff that some days you cannot pick up a phone call without being screamed at by a client or someone working in the field. Most of the time you get yelled at for something you didn’t even do, but the clients and staff are so tired of consistent scheduling issues and other problems that they take out their anger on anyone who will listen. 

It is very apparent that the upper management at Paramed does not care for their clients or their employees. We are all just numbers in the awful system that is Canadian healthcare. I have heard many of my coworkers in the office voice that when you bring up an issue to management, you may as well be speaking into a void because nobody will ever address it again.

After about a year of working for the company, I realized that I didn’t even bother bringing up concerns or issues anymore if I couldn’t fix them on my own. That is the kind of environment they foster. They ignore you until you realize that your voice there is meaningless. 

The only thing that keeps me here are my coworkers. They are the ones dealing with the angry calls, even thought they know they can’t do anything to fix the problems because UPPER management is useless. Supervisors of coordination get blamed far too often for the faults of their superiors, they voice our concerns and also get nothing back in return. Meanwhile, their superiors get to sit in their offices and remain in ignorance about the pain they are causing to clients and their own staff. 

UPPER MANAGEMENT is who you want to blame all of the scheduling issues and missed care on, not the supervisors of coordination or coordinators. We have ALL told them hundreds of times exactly why scheduling issues and glitches are happening and they either have no idea what we are talking about because they have no hands-on computer experience, or they say they will do something and never do. Every time there is a new system implemented, we tell them it won’t work before they do it, they NEVER listen, and it ALWAYS backfires. 

Stay far away from this place if you want to keep your sanity. Everyone there is looking for a new job. Nobody is staying there long term because there is no room for growth (new hires make only slightly less than someone who has worked there for a decade). I will be taking my experience and leaving very soon. Experience is the only thing to gain from this job. It’s merely a stepping stone to another career path, and it’s sad because management made it that way. I would stay if someone listened. 

I worked as a Home Support Worker (HSW) for 5+ years and found the patient care aspect of the job to be the most rewarding part of the role. A lot of the frontline staff are also great - hardworking, caring, and genuinely trying to do their best in a system that often makes thing harder than they need to be.

That said, the job itself comes with a lot of challenges that make it extremely hard to stay in long-term.

Pay is on the lower side considering the physical demands of the role, the responsibility involved, and the amount of driving required. Mileage pay only helps the tiniest bit, but doesn't cover the actual cost of using my own vehicle, especially when you factor in gas, wear and tear, insurance, and long drives for single visits in out-of-the-way locations.

Scheduling is one of the biggest issues. You are expected to keep large blocks of your day available, but there is no guarantee you will actually get full-time hours. Some days you'll be available all morning and only get one visit. On top of that, schedules can and will change very late in the evening or overnight, which means you are expected to constantly check your work phone outside of work hours just to make sure you didn't miss anything.

We are also expected to call patients ahead of visits, typically the night before a visit, even though this isn't paid time. This often means dealing with frustration from patients about scheduling issues that we have no control over.

Communication from the office is inconsistent at best and non-existent at worst. Sometimes questions or concerns are answered quickly, but most of the time there is a lack of response even when things are time-sensitive or affects patient care. There have been numerous where what I have been told by coordinators does not match what is written in a patient's care plan, which makes things a lot more difficult as you don't know what instructions to follow.

I also noticed that because of inconsistent hours, a number of coworkers have had to take on second jobs just to make ends meet. Even people who are fully available and willing to work full-time cannot rely on ParaMed to give enough hours. Despite ParaMed claiming to make changes to providing everyone consistent full-time hours, I have yet to see that change actually happen.

There is not a lot of room for growth either. For anyone looking for advancement or long-term career path, it is extremely limited in terms of opportunities for growth and pay.

Overall, patients and frontline staff made the job worthwhile, but the scheduling, pay, lack of communication from coordination and supervisors, and lack of stability makes it an extremely difficult place to stay long-term.


Absolute WORST company I have ever worked for. They don’t even deserve one star! Management is on a complete power trip, and will belittle and degrade you in front of other workers just to show they are in charge. If you enjoy working for pennies on the dollar this is absolutely the company for you. They pay their nurses less than PSWs and expect them to work beyond full scope. Pay cheques are consistently wrong, and are never rectified until weeks later. They don’t think that people have a life outside of work, or actual responsibilities. Pay was always missing at LEAST half of worked hours, but because management is lazy and inconsiderate, they expect you to wait weeks to be reimbursed and then try to blame you for their mistakes. Training is nil and they don’t care if you aren’t comfortable doing skills or tasks. They tell you to read the policy and procedure book and figure it out instead of actually training you, which puts the patients at risk and your license on the line. The clinic nurses have it even worse... they see upwards of 20 patients/day and are paid less than community nurses and are expected to work through their breaks. Workplace bullying is guaranteed and management doesn’t care... they actually warn you that employees will bully you if they don’t like you. This company has one of the highest turn over rates and can’t keep supervisors/employees because of management. They have such a hard time keeping nursing supervisors and there is a new one about every month. They are essentially useless and a lot of them don’t have actual nursing experience and can’t answer questions as they don’t know how to do/perform a lot of the skills. I could literally write a book with all of the negative traits within this company. Please save yourself the time and effort and look else where. Labour board is actively investigating them for a number of different reasons.

learned a lot during my employment with ParaMed Health Care agency. Gained the knowledge and skills during the everyday work. Every day at work is different can be more or less stressful. Learn to handle different situations with confidence and how to prioritize my duties.  I learned many nursing skills required at work in home care environment and to perform the nursing treatments independently within the scope of nursing practice. I received a lot of support from the Agency management when I needed .Management provided employees with In services/ training to update and refresh nursing knowledge and skills i many important areas of nursing practice, like wound care, care for venous, arterial and diabetic ulcers and various wound care products and dressings types available to treat and promote healing of wounds. Learned application of VAC therapy to treat and heal wounds and preventive measures to prevent ulcer formations. Learned technique of application specialty compression bandages, like Coban Light, Coban 2 compression bandage systems or Velcro Bandages System applied to treat Lymphodema of legs.
Every year management organized Skills Fair where nursing skills were reviewed and refreshed. I worked in a multicultural environment where workers treat each other with respect and value  other cultures values and support each other. Working with colleagues at work as a team and in case of emergency have a reliable one to cover the clients from your workload if you can not.  
The hardest part of the job would be to get to the client's place in a harsh winter weather and to cope with the traffics. You have to give yourself a lots of time on the road to avoid frustration.
The most enjoyable part of the job and great satisfaction was to see the clients health problems improved or completely healed with nursing interventions. and to see smile on their faces and gratitude.

You have been warned from the title.

Paramed is a PROFIT driven company where you will be treated as a number. Mileage is not paid by the company, it is a 'travel allowance' which is income that is subject to taxes and deductions. It will kick you into a higher tax bracket meaning you are now working for minimum wage. You will be under scrutiny with Canada Revenue Agency. This will result in annual audits due to paperwork being improperly filled out by management. You will be told by the company you are NOT allowed to keep a documented record of your travels due to it being confidential client information. The CRA will tell you they need it or you can pay back ALL of your taxes for the time you are being audited for. Good luck trying to speak to anyone in management about any issues because your problems are below their pay grade and management will direct you to upper management who will redirect to lower management.  Accounting and HR departments are a revolving door, dont waste your time learning any names from any of these departments because they will likely not be around for very long. The employee discount reward program is a minimal percentage off corporate rate for Costco (fine if you shop there or live anywhere near it). No discounts for anything like a uniform allowance.

The employee training consists of online training modules of the bare minimum required safety and WHMIS but useful courses like CPR and first aid training you have to pay for yourself and take on your own time outside of work hours. 

Good health benefits with drugs and dental, this is one of precious few companies that do offer this.

The best part of the job is that it is an otherwise rewarding career and you meet awesome people, clients and coworkers alike.

People aren't generally happy with Paramed and generally end up leaving within a year. The turnover rate at the Ottawa location is staggering, and for good reason.
Your typical day at the office is dealing with a myriad of issues whether it be with clients, families, scheduling and lack of staff. The phone never stops ringing. You have to be available for every call even if you have 500 other things on your plate to do, and then you get maybe a dozen more within a short period of time with the phone calls.
You can't possibly do everything you're expected to do with the time you're given. You're entitled to one hour break but many coordinators work through their breaks and some stay and hour or two later completing their tasks for the day.
Management often tries to make coordination feel bad about the inability to staff clients, when a complaint comes in through the LHIN, but coordination is often pressured to take on new clients. Made to feel bad for things way beyond your control. Interactions with management feel like interrogations.
This company is about about corporate interests over the well being of vulnerable clients. Sometimes you call the same clients night after night to unfill visits and it's really disheartening.
Management claims to care about the struggles coordination has, but instead of trying to tackle the systemic problems, does things like pizza parties and gives out flowers instead. Feels insulting.
I loved my coworkers there and some supervisors, as well as gained some valuable experience working there. But those are the only positive things I have to say about working at Paramed.

I am originally from Ukraine. I was employed with ParaMed since 2013-2018. Working with my clients and meeting new people was a positive experience. I enjoyed it very much and was proud of myself to make a difference in people's lives.

Everything was great until I got ill and had a surgery...After my surgery I could no longer work as a PSW, and my employment was unlawfully terminated shortly after.

Despite all of the medical notes from my GP and the surgeons, I was not offered a SUITABLE modified duty work. I was still forced to go to service clients. Management did not care about the fact that I just had a surgery, and was unable to perform my previous tasks as a PSW. They did not care about me not having a valid CPR certificate, or a current Police Check, which is a HUGE violation of the policy.

At some point, District Director reassured me about getting an Assignment Coordinator position, which is a sitting job and is suitable for my post-surgery condition. However, he did not keep his word; moreover, later on, he denied everything we have talked about.

Upper Management is unapproachable; they do not care about their employees' opinion, safety and well-being. They are non-cooperative and act unprofessionally by ignoring employees' concerns. You must come to the Head Office a million times in order to be heard. They do not want to do their job!

I would like to add that former District Director and Operations Manager ( from Victoria Park Branch) were terminated after my complaints.
Thank God -- there is new management now!

I started working for paramed back in 2015, and recently quit. I was originally hired full time but received part time hours.in order to make a living you literally have to work yourself to death starting from 7am - 11pm with lots of odd half hour breaks here and there .. the breaks sound great right. But in all honesty, you never have enough time for your own personal life with this company, and they are not understanding to that. 

Management and supervisors are the WORST. they pick favourites, they bully their staff, and they almost NEVER show any appreciation for any amount of work you will ever do for them. The first two weeks I worked for them, I didn't receive a pay cheque. They told me their computers screwed up, and I had to wait an extra 5 days to receive my cheque. The following two weeks on my next pay day it happened again. And just recently they did it to me another two times. One cheque they only paid me half my hours, and the next cheque wasn't in my account in general in which I had to get higher management involved. Because of these screw up I had late fees on bills, I got Nsfs on my accounts in which paramed did not go good for. 

I worked for paramed for 9 months and was supposed to receive benefits after three. I asked in two occasions about getting my benefits in which managment told me they'd look into It but would never get back to me with a straight answer. 

If you enjoy being degraded, not appreciated, screwed over, and disrespected this is the company to work for. Highly un recommended, even to the general public.

Currently, I am working for Para Med Home Health Care Services. 
Participate in the planning and coordination of total client care and follow the nursing care plan for each assigned client. Observe and evaluate the care of the client. Assess clients’ safety status, including physical environment, make recommendations, implement interventions and advocate on the client’s behalf to ensure client’s safety is maintained. Keep records and accurately report on the clients' condition and care. Prepare clinical/progress notes on each visit incorporating into the clinical record. Assist the client with the activities of daily living while teaching appropriate self-care techniques. Provide and maintain a safe environment for the client as well as providing an optimum physical and emotional environment Assist physician and registered nurse in complex nursing situations.
    Participate in case conference, in-services and other programs, meetings as required. Uphold and promote the organization’s values and philosophy relating particularly to ethics, morality, and integrity as set out in ParaMed's Code of Conduct. Complete all other duties as assigned. This all above helped me to be a confident nurse at all my care. since we work as a team we have good work management. it helped me to learn many cultural believes since I visit clients who came from the whole world. There is no hard but driving during winter time would be a minor negative impact as we drive a lot. I really enjoy the nursing job at all.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Coordinator 1 salary reported	$23.00 per hour
Support worker 35 salaries reported	$22.31 per hour
Infirmier 24 salaries reported	$34.88 per hour
Préposé au service de soutien personnel 7 salaries reported	$21.43 per hour
Infirmier auxiliaire autorisé 21 salaries reported	$28.31 per hour

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