A home health care service is expanding its nurse assistant training program and becoming a Lynchburg retailer, too.
Generation Solutions has opened a new office on Langhorne Road that will begin retailing medical supplies next month. In June, the company will consolidate its Certified Nursing Assistant classes from several locations into one location at The Plaza.
Tulane Patterson, founder, said the business is growing because it provides services the way people want them. “We’ve been receptive to … what the market needs, versus telling the market, ‘this is what you need,’” Patterson said.
“In this environment, when someone’s growing, that’s a good thing,” he said.
Patterson started Generation Solutions in 1998. Its focus, then as now, is to help elderly people stay in their own homes instead of moving to nursing homes or assisted-living facilities.
A couple of years later, the business added a CNA training program. There was, and continues to be, an undersupply in the area of CNAs, who provide patient care such as bathing and taking vital signs. Even more will be needed as the baby boomer generation ages, Patterson said.
The training program has classes in Lynchburg, Roanoke, Lovingston, Culpeper and other parts of Virginia. Last year it trained 500 students, Patterson said.
In the Lynchburg area, the CNA classes are held in several different locations, where there often is not enough space. To change that, Generation Solutions in June will open a training and education center in the lower section of The Plaza shopping center in Lynchburg.
The center will have rooms for the CNA classes and could host public health education events too, Patterson said.
He said he would like the center to become a state-certified testing location. Currently, the closest CNA testing sites are in Altavista and Roanoke, according to a schedule of the tests.
The company also is launching a retail store on Langhorne Road, near the intersection with Tate Springs Road. The storefront is just an office now, but in late May it will be stocked with medical supplies ranging from child-sized ankle braces to walkers.
Although Generation Solutions has been able to sell some medical equipment since 2005, this is the first storefront venture.
Patterson said technology is making that easier and more affordable. Automatic, timed medication dispensers and home monitoring systems cost a few dollars a day, but they make a huge difference, Patterson said.
“It’s amazing how these kinds of things aren’t expensive and reduce the costs of staying at home.”
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