Care Across America
"Care Across America, an Approved Senior Network® Podcast"—your go-to source for engaging conversations and practical insights from home care and senior care experts across the United States. Each episode will spotlight industry professionals, and their referral networks, sharing impactful stories, proven strategies, and innovative solutions in senior care. This podcast is perfect for professionals, adult children of aging parents, and family members struggling with senior care choices and care.
Care Across America
From Kitchen Table to Multi-State Success: The Story of CareCo Founder, Helga Pfanner
A tiny cup of vanilla and a wooden spoon changed everything. That stark image of a proud father in a rehab hallway pushed Helga Pfanner to bring him home—and to build CareCo, a home care model that treats dignity, joy, and reliability as daily practices, not slogans. From those first days at a kitchen table to a multi‑state operation across Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island, we unpack how a personal mission grew into a system that actually shows up.
We walk through what happens when families call for help: a real conversation with a liaison or care manager, a free assessment at home, and a plan crafted around needs and preferences—favorite breakfast routines, pets, reading habits, and what truly makes a day feel normal. Matching is intentional. The right caregiver is chosen for the client’s environment and personality, so the relationship feels natural, not forced. Along the way we share stories of creative care, like arranging dog visits for a client with dementia, and getting the New York Times on the table because familiar rituals matter.
Operations matter just as much as heart. Instead of crossing fingers during call‑outs, CareCo keeps trained CNAs and PCAs on standby in the office, dressed and ready to deploy. We talk about fixing a broken sit‑to‑stand lift within an hour, installing free air conditioners during brutal heat waves, and even reserving hotel floors during regional power outages to keep seniors safe. That commitment led to taking over a 168‑hour case during the holidays and never missing a single hour—proof that backup plans must be real, not promises.
We also tackle the hardest moments: when a parent refuses help and independence collides with risk. You’ll hear how a poor first match became a better second match and, over time, a trusted routine that brought peace to five worried sons. Hiring, boundaries, and culture tie it all together—why heart and punctuality can’t be trained, and how loving clients still lives within a clear professional line. Subscribe, share this story with someone navigating elder care, and leave a review with the one question you most want answered next.
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My name is Helga Fanner and the business name is CARCO. I started it in 2005, actually 2004, but made it official in 2005. And it's been quite the trip.
SPEAKER_00:It has. And tell us more about what location did you start? Was it the Waterford, Connecticut?
SPEAKER_01:Yes, I started actually I started on my kitchen table because I took care of my dad. I was in a totally different business line and business background, nothing in healthcare, but my dad got sick, and my mother called me and said, Your father's in a rehab. And I said, What are you talking about? And I she said, I can't bring him home and leave him there. And she said, It's impossible to bring him home. So I flew back to Connecticut and went and saw him, and he was sitting in the hall with a little tiny cup of vanilla ice cream and a wooden spoon that somebody had taken him. My father was super polite always. And he said, You have to get me out of here. This is the worst hotel I've ever been in. They call this ice cream, they call this a spoon. They have no coffee ice cream and no Tia Maria. And you gotta get me out of here.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my.
SPEAKER_01:And so I brought him to my house. I thought about it. I brought him to my house. I could have hired someone to take care of them. I told my mom how to do it. I said, it's a job. You have to pay attention, but you have to make sure you have the right aids. She said, Can you do it for me? And I said, Yeah, I'll do it for you, for us, for our family. Took care of him. And then his best friend was also in a nursing home. And the family said, Can you bring him home? And I said, Yeah, I can bring him home to you guys, and brought him home. And then one thing led to another. And then I figured I'd better get insurance. So I was like, okay, I have to have at least eight clients. And I was always going to go back to what I had been doing most of my life. And just it just never happened. And it just evolved from there. And I do believe in being home. It's very important to me. We all want to be home with our dog. So we do. And with our dog or a glass of wine or whatever it is that makes us happy. And that's home. Our pillows. That's home.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, absolutely. And so I I feel like every time I talk to a home care agency owner, they definitely have a story that sometimes starts just like that. It's either a parent, grandparent, and I know that this business is a business of heart. You couldn't have been in it this long if you didn't love what you do. And I know days are hard, but you you have grown this business from one location to many locations and in many states now. So you want to tell us a little about all your coverage?
SPEAKER_01:Okay, so we're in Sanford, Maine. So we're in your county, Maine. One of my, I shouldn't say this, favorite offices. I love Maine. It's absolutely gorgeous up there. And we have an office in New Hampshire. We have an office in Plattstowl, relatively new. We have a couple offices in Massachusetts, one in Worcester County and one in Peabody. Actually, City of Worcester and Peabody. And we have one in Richmond, Rhode Island. Wow. All relatively. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's great. And so that means you have caregivers in all those states.
SPEAKER_01:We do.
SPEAKER_00:Any equipped to help anybody in your within your reach. So that's awesome. Since 2005, how many you've probably taken care of hundreds and hundreds of clients since the time you started. Is that right?
SPEAKER_01:Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Hundreds and hundreds. I have no idea how many.
SPEAKER_00:Hundreds.
unknown:Yep.
SPEAKER_00:So it went from your kitchen table to an office, and now in several states. That that is crazy and amazing. It seems like a long time ago. It's 20 years.
SPEAKER_01:That's that's it seemed like nothing. It was just boom. There's always something going on in this business that never sleeps. It's 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Crazy business.
SPEAKER_00:That's true. It's a business that never sleeps. So tell us now when somebody calls your office or calls the main line. I'm looking at this from the perspective of an adult child of an aging parent. I'm not in this business and I never have been. What happens when someone calls your office? What's the process they go through to perhaps get care started?
SPEAKER_01:Okay, so the first thing is whoever answers the phone is just going to set the individual up with someone that's going to lead them in the right direction. So it'll be one of our either a liaison, a state liaison, or a care manager. And they're going to go over the process and find out what the needs are and what a good fit would be and put everything in place that they need. Then we come out for a free assessment and we go over how we handle things because our agency is a little different than most of them out there, which is, I think, why we're pretty successful and why I can sleep at night is because there's a lot of things that can go wrong if you're not set up. And then the person comes out, whoever goes out goes over the care needs, also goes over what the individual likes. What makes this person happy? Because for me, this business is also about being happy. It's about being home, being happy, and having a better life.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, absolutely. That's what makes it all worthwhile is to be able to stay in your home and invite your dog and your coffee and your in the right kind of ice cream.
SPEAKER_01:And that's right. That's absolutely true.
SPEAKER_00:Yep. And so the caregivers that are assigned also get that information. So when you're pairing up a caregiver with that client, they're a good fit and they already have some idea of what that client wants in their life, what they like. Yes.
SPEAKER_01:Yep. What they what we have a whole team that handles it. So it's what they like to eat, where they like to go, do they need the New York Times? And this is something I say, and it's not even true anymore, but back in the day, it was I had a client, they wanted the New York Times on their table for breakfast, and we did it. We made sure that was part of what we did. We've done a lot of crazy things over the year. We had somebody whose husband passed away, their dog passed away, they had dementia a little bit, and couldn't remember that the dog was gone, couldn't remember most things. And we had the neighbor's dog, she had the same kind of dog that used to visit her just to bring a little joy into her life because she loved that dog of hers. So we've done a lot of little things over the years, or big things even, depending.
SPEAKER_00:And you said we do things different, and that's why we've been around for so long. So what are the things that you guys do that you think are different than everybody else that's kept you around?
SPEAKER_01:We do two things, and there's been a lot of ups and downs because these management changes. I was sick for a while, so I wasn't I was absent for several years. Uh stuff been resolved quite a bit. And so things have gone up and down, but the core things we did, I think, that are different, that I've always pushed into this business is one, we are not just there to make sure they toilet in and bathe. We're there to make their lives better. That's one. Two, we have standby people that are in our office that we can send to a case. If somebody calls out, and I'm not saying this is flawless because sometimes you just don't have enough people, but we have someone in that office that also gives care. And if someone calls out and then it's last minute, we send someone from the office that is a CNA or a PCA to take care of that individual right away. So it's not the same as other companies where they make 20 phone calls to see who's available. We have people on standby, available in that office, dressed in scrubs, ready to go out. I think another thing that makes us different is that we don't say we're just like family, like some of the other companies. We love our clients because you can't help it. You're involved in their lives. But we always tell our employees we are professionals in a client's home. You're allowed to love your client, but there's a line. This is the line of professional, professionalism, and that needs to be maintained. So I think those are three things that set us apart from a lot of companies that are out there.
SPEAKER_00:I think that I think you're right. That loving your clients is definitely heartfelt and a plus, but uh for sure, that professionalism, the way you're dressed, the way you speak to someone, all of that is also very important. And as you care for, especially baby boomers, and now we're getting into some Gen Xers, they appreciate that that level of respect. Even if they have a great relationship with you, it's a professional, respectful relationship. And kidding around is okay, but it's show them the respect they deserve, frankly. Yes, that's great.
SPEAKER_01:It's professional profess a professional. That doesn't mean you can't love them because we're in people's homes. Even I walk in and out of people's homes in between, and I'm like, oh, I get it, but you've got to keep that line in place.
SPEAKER_00:And you said that you have somebody on call to help for call with call-ins. And by far, that is where you're not on call.
SPEAKER_01:A lot of companies, a lot of companies have someone on call. We have someone that does simple paperwork in the office that prints things for applications that is that we can send out. The minute we get that call, we send them out. We don't say, okay, who's on call tonight? And we cover, I don't know, 20,000 hours a week, I think. Which is a yeah. So it's not flawless, but from what we've seen, it's better than any system out there, what we do. So I am very proud of us. When I opened a company in Maine, I we picked up a client who was with another agency, and it's a large client, it's 168 hours a week. And we went in there as a fill-in company for a couple hours here and a couple of hours there. We saved her through the holidays, and I finally said to her, You need to give us the whole account because right now what's happening isn't very fair to us. We're gonna call last minute when that agency can't accommodate you. And she hemmed in hard and she finally gave it to us. We have never missed a single hour, a single day since we took over. And I'm proud of us, I'm proud of who we are. Yeah, and this is a big agency with a big name that that this client came from. And now we're getting another one, also up in Maine, from the same agency.
SPEAKER_00:Great.
SPEAKER_01:We do a better job.
SPEAKER_00:So it comes from leadership, it starts with you and all the leadership you have on your in your company and that model and that attitude and that all the things that you put in place to cover is really what makes a difference here. Your belief in how this should work is what makes everything else work so much better. And having somebody in the office who can take off and go to that person is wonderful. I always have said that I would choose an agency over hiring a private caregiver simply because, and it's not simple, but it's because I want that safety. I want to know there's somebody, there is a backup plan. Have a clean. Yeah, you have a whole group of people behind you.
SPEAKER_01:We had a sit and stand that wasn't working this morning. Okay. They I said, look on the device. There's probably a phone number where the device came from. They said they'd come out tomorrow. I said, You're gonna come out tomorrow? I had one of my guys that deals with hydraulics and cars and does all kinds of things for us and uh free air conditioning. We gave people this summer, they installed them and they do all kinds of things for us. And I sent them over there, and it was as simple as replacing the batteries. And he had it done an hour later, and it was up and running, and she got out of bed. And that that makes us different.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's going above and beyond. Yeah, was she gonna lay in bed for the whole for till tomorrow?
SPEAKER_01:Tomorrow, exactly. And this summer we had people who, you know, and they were Medicaid, they couldn't afford air conditioning. I got a couple of phone calls, and then we checked on everyone, which we usually do in a more timely fashion, maybe than this year, and we ended up installing air conditioning in three people's homes for free, just a gift, giving something back, and made three families happy that their loved ones were taken care of and that the house wasn't so hot that just stupid little things. We put flower boxes at the YMCA in Richmond, Rhode Island. We donated them, we installed them just to brighten the place up because our office is next to them. We have a flower box. And they said, Oh, we wish we had flower boxes. So I said, My guys will put flower boxes in for you. So we put flower boxes in, and they loved it, and it's it wasn't that big a deal.
SPEAKER_00:It was just six flower boxes and lots of little things that beautifying the area, making everybody happy, and air conditioning kind of is a big deal sometimes. And we've had brutal, brutal summer heat this year. And I am certain that you know that little act on your part is made you probably prevented hospitalizations. Who knows what would have happened? We hear stories in the winter and in the summer of seniors who don't want to reach out, don't want to say anything, don't want to be a bother, and they are overcome by heat or cold or we do have reporting in place for heat, which is where this came from.
SPEAKER_01:And also, if there's the year they had all the snowstorms in New England and there was no power everywhere, we had the top floor of a motel in East Lime, Connecticut, where we put seniors and caregivers up. That sounds insane, but the shelters didn't have room. A lot of our clients are accustomed to something better. What are you gonna do if there's no power? Now, a lot of the houses since then have Generacts. That year, I don't know if I remember what year it was, changed a lot of things because it was nonstop power outages in Connecticut.
SPEAKER_00:So yeah, that is rough. That is so hard on our seniors. That is, yeah. And yeah, so doing little things like that, that's a big deal, renting out a whole top of a hotel or a whole roof, floor on a lot of people.
SPEAKER_01:Well, they weren't they gave us a deal because they didn't have anything going on. There was snow four feet high. So they were happy and we made it work and we worked with a couple of snow plow drivers that helped us out. I actually had the fire department in Waterford go to one location for us. Um but that's great.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that that is so that that's the kind of that's the kind of service you don't ever want to have to be in that position, but that's the kind of service you're looking for when it comes to a home care agency. And I know you guys just do an outstanding job all over these states that you cover. So is there anything else you'd like to tell us? I know one thing I would like to know is when you're hiring caregivers, what do you look for in a caregiver? What is the thing that says, yes, that's this person would be good for us?
SPEAKER_01:That they have a heart. Punctuality and having a heart is two things you cannot train. Most other things you can teach someone, but that you cannot. And that is always my number one because honestly, we work in high-end multi-million dollar houses and within the ghetto, quite honestly. And it's a matching game. You have to have a care a caregiver that can work in a certain environment and be comfortable. You have to have a client that has a caregiver that functions in that environment and everyone is comfortable. So that's a big thing. But that's easy. But having somebody who cares in this business is the biggest thing. You need someone.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it has to be a calling almost to do that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I agree. I agree. Not just somebody who can't get a job and wanna says, okay, I'm gonna do this for five minutes. It's one of the big when I interview someone, I want to know that they care and that they will be on time and that they don't call out. And then there's always clients who the family wants the client to have services, and the family doesn't. They're worried about their loved one, and the loved one doesn't want anybody in their house, and they've gotten lost three times, the driver's license was taken, and blah, blah, blah. And how do you cope with that? And how do you make that work? I'll tell you some a funny story. I'll make it short. We picked up a client in Maine, and beautiful family, five sons, and the sons love their mom, and the mom wants nothing to do with any kind of help. And she kicked us out of the house practically when we got there. So we went around in a circle. So the next day we get a phone call. The aide shows up, there's no one at the house, and the son, one of the sons calls up and says, My mom took the truck, she has no license, by the way, and drove to Bangor or somewhere up north, five hours north, and is at the hunting lodge. So we sent the caregiver up to get her with a couple with a company car. And they brought her back. And this girl wasn't the best match, but then we tried someone else. And now we're in there three times a week. And there's a lot of happiness. And the woman's starting to look forward to seeing this caregiver because they have things in common. And so we're gonna slowly work it so that the family's at peace, that mom's okay. Because one of the things that really hit me, I actually went to this meeting, I don't go to most meetings anymore, but one of the things that hit me was this because the manager in Maine was in Alaska for two weeks. So I was in Maine for two weeks, manning the office. So I went to this meeting. And one of the things that got to me was when the son was arguing with the mom, and the mom was saying, blah, blah, blah, I don't want anybody in my house. And he said, every morning when I stop here, I'm afraid I'm gonna find you dead on the floor. And it killed me. And he meant it. It was not about anything other than keeping her safe. Yeah. So we worked hard at making that work, and it's starting to, slowly starting to.
SPEAKER_00:It's sometimes it is a slow roll into getting someone a little bit more involved and a little bit more accepting as time goes on. That's another hard part of this job, is people who don't want the help, don't want someone in their home. And you all find a way to slowly but surely insert yourselves in a positive way and with a positive match of a caregiver that helps them feel comfortable. That's really important. I want to thank you for talking to me and telling all of us about CareCo, what you guys do, how far you've come in 20 years, which is amazing. And we'll make sure that folks see and hear this and know how much you care about what's going on out there for all the clients you serve. Okay, appreciate it very much. Thank you.
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