The BC Liberals have increased provincial health-care spending to more than $15 billion in the current fiscal year from $14.2 billion in the year ended March 31, 2008. Campbell expects health-care spending to jump to $15.7 billion in the fiscal year that started April 1.
Dehart believes the funding won't be enough to meet B.C. seniors homes' health-care needs. Seniors seem to agree.
Two years ago, Nurse Next Door had two franchisees. Today, Dehart has 23 franchises, and he expects that number to double within the year in part because of a new push to expand into Ontario.
Michelle Braun, who opened a Nurse Next Door franchise in North Vancouver crunched numbers and determined that paying a $30,000 one-time franchise fee and 5 per cent of her revenue in royalty payments was worth it.
Nurse Next Door promises that all its caregivers:
• have passed criminal record checks;
• do not have tuberculosis; and
• are fully insured so the senior will not be at risk if the caregiver trips and falls.
Shaun Karp, who expanded his 17-year-old Karp Health Services to include a Karp Home Care division three years ago, pledges the same thing.
Karp's homecare division increased revenue by 30 per cent last year. Still, he believes it's tougher for an entrepreneur to succeed at home health care than Braun and Dehart let on.
"The reality of the industry is that it's not that rosy," he said. "You have to work and you have to spend money in order to generate sales."
- Glen Korstrom
From the Western Investor, August 2009
