A typical work schedule for Emelia Dokyi Negron consists of leaving her home in Fordham Heights for three weeks and working as a caregiver in Hamden, CT.  She returns to her home in the Bronx for a week before starting the cycle again. That was before the pandemic and travel restrictions were implemented.

Now, Negron, 52, has spent months working in Hamden with only a single four-day break in August to visit her family in the Bronx. For her work as a live-in caregiver during the pandemic, that has been described as “above and beyond” the call of duty, Negron was recently honored with a $1,000 Homecare Hero Award by her employer, Assisted Living Services (ALS).

The award came as a surprise to Negron as she was working at a client’s home on the day of notification. “They [ALS] told me they were delivering a box of masks and gloves,” she recalls. “I was so happy when they came and told me about [the award].”

The job of live-in caregivers has always been considered as that of an essential worker, especially during the pandemic. Among their responsibilities, in caring for their clients, are toileting needs, dressing and undressing, feeding, safety monitoring, travel and transfer help, and medication reminders.

The work is labor intensive and can make extraordinary demands on care providers. Mario D’Aquila, chief operating officer at ALS, describes the job of caregiver as critical. “Our care givers can routinely work 10 and 12-hour shifts because we specialize on those [clients] that need us most of the days,” D’Aquila told the Norwood News.

D’Aquila saw how workers like Negron “really went above and beyond” what the job usually requires. In addition to Negron, ALS also honored 19 other caregivers with $1,000 bonuses. Before the pandemic, the company used to present a monthly $5,000 Platinum Caregiver Award to one member of staff.

“We wanted to give more caregivers the opportunity for a financial reward as they displayed incredible dedication to our clients from the very start of the COVID-19 pandemic,” D’Aquila wrote in a press release, announcing the new more expansive award program.

For her part, Negron is glad to have a job as she sees how being unemployed has stressed out so many people. “I’m very happy I can work,” she said. “They [ALS] are very professional,” she added.

ALS employs over 400 caregivers in Connecticut, and D’Aquila has received words of appreciation about the group’s caregivers from many of the company’s clients. “We know what [you’re] doing because our clients rave about you,” he said, addressing the caregivers. Indeed, D’Aquila said ALS would not be here without them. “They are 100 percent the most important aspect of our company,” he said.

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Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.