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About Care at Home

Care at Home, formerly known as Home Health Foundation, leads the way in community healthcare by always putting people first. We make it simple for people to receive home, palliative and hospice care when and where they need it. Whether we’re delivering nursing support to your doorstep or bedside within High Pointe House, we’re here to care for you.

Who we are

Our roots can be traced to 1895, during a time when the area’s first “district nursing program” emerged to offer mill-working families at-home nursing care. For nearly 130 years, Home Health Foundation fostered a legacy as the region’s most trusted provider of home healthcare for infants, children and adults. Then, we evolved to better meet the needs of our growing community.

We announced our change to Care at Home in 2022 to reflect our closer relationship with Tufts Medicine. Together, we’re reimagining the continuum of healthcare by bringing care closer to home, advancing medicine and focusing on health as much as healing. Our care teams proudly serve 110 cities and towns in the Merrimack Valley, northeastern Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire.  

We understand that it’s never easy moving a loved one into hospice care, or navigating life as a first-time parent. It’s OK to admit when you need support to better support the people you care about. That’s why we’re here. So wherever you call home, we’ll meet you there.

We honor veterans

We are honored to serve those who have served in the military. We are proud to participate in the We Honor Veterans program, a National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization program in collaboration with the Department of Veterans Affairs. Through this program, hospice professionals nationwide focus on a single purpose: to provide comfort and support to veterans at the end of their lives.

America’s veterans have done everything asked of them in their mission to serve our country and we believe it’s never too late to give them a hero’s welcome home. It’s an honor to serve these men and women with the dignity they deserve; it’s our way of saying thank you for the sacrifices they have made in serving us.

Our history

Our story starts at Lawrence General Hospital in 1895 when we fulfilled a need for nursing services among the mill-working families of Lawrence, Methuen and North Andover. Financing for the program came from the City Mission, a charitable organization in the city of Lawrence.

Health conditions at the turn of the century were poor compared with today’s standards. Diphtheria, tuberculosis, typhoid fever and high infant mortality were rampant and were fueled by poverty, a lack of knowledge, poor sanitation and hygiene. The nurses of the day played a key role in teaching proper hygiene, food storage and cleanliness. They truly were the first community “medical social workers” in addition to performing nursing practice.

Read more about our history

Around the same time, the city of Malden was also forming their own community nursing program. The Community Nursing Association was founded in 1899 as the city hired a trained nurse, Miss Ella A. Myers, to perform community nursing. The development of the Association was in response to an industrial fire some years earlier, which spurred community leaders to rally around those impacted by the accident, and which eventually led to the development of a day nursery and community visiting nursing some years later.

As other cities were forming home visiting nurse programs — notably in Boston, Philadelphia and New York — a private corporation called the Locks and Canals funded the Middlesex Women’s Club in 1908 and requested they begin their home nursing program. Two nurses were hired, Miss Katherine Walsh and Miss Blanche M. Craven.

In subsequent years, the Visiting Nurses in Lawrence, Lowell and Malden expanded their services to more communities. Rehabilitation therapists, social workers and home health aides joined nurses as a member of the clinical team. 

Collectively, we've been providing care through events that changed local, national, world and medical history, such as disasters, epidemics, the arrival of successive waves of immigrants, the Great Depression, world wars and returning veterans, the creation of Medicare and Medicaid, growth of healthcare knowledge and treatment over the last century.

Today, Tufts Medicine Care at Home is comprised of both hospice and home health providers, delivering care to people of all ages in their homes, in facilities and with a wide variety of diagnoses and needs. 

Contact us
map-pin
Tufts Medicine Care at Home
360 Merrimack Street
Suite 425
Lawrence, MA 01843

Referral Department
Toll Free: 1.800.333.4799
Phone: 978.552.4444

Specialty areas of care at Care at Home

Communities we serve

Care at Home is the leader in home health and hospice care in more than 95 communities in the Merrimack Valley, Northeastern Massachusetts and Southern New Hampshire. Together, our not-for-profit agencies form a unique and comprehensive continuum and are committed to delivering care with compassion and the highest standards of excellence.

Massachusetts, A–M
  • Amesbury
  • Andover
  • Arlington
  • Beverly
  • Billerica
  • Boxford
  • Bradford
  • Burlington
  • Byfield
  • Cambridge
  • Charlestown
  • Chelmsford
  • Chelsea
  • Danvers
  • Dracut
  • Dunstable
  • East Boston
  • Everett
  • Georgetown
  • Groveland
  • Hamilton 
  • Haverhill
  • Ipswich
  • Lawrence
  • Lowell
  • Lynn
  • Lynnfield    
  • Malden
  • Medford
  • Melrose
  • Merrimack
  • Methuen
  • Middleton
Massachusetts, N–Z
  • Reading
  • Revere
  • Rowley
  • Salem
  • Salisbury
  • Saugus
  • Somerville
  • Stoneham
  • Tewksbury
  • Topsfield
  • Tyngsboro
  • Wakefield
  • Wenham
  • Newbury
  • Newburyport
  • North Andover
  • North Reading
  • Peabody
  • Pepperell
  • Plum Island
  • West Newbury
  • Westford
  • Wilmington
  • Winchester
  • Winthrop
  • Woburn
New Hampshire, A–M
  • Atkinson
  • Bedford
  • Danville
  • Bedford
  • Danville
  • Derry
  • East Hampstead
  • East Kingston
  • Exeter
  • Greenland
  • Hampstead
  • Hampton
  • Hampton Falls
  • Hudson
  • Kensington
  • Kingston
  • Litchfield
  • Londonderry
  • Manchester
  • Merrimack
New Hampshire, N–Z
  • Nashua
  • Newton
  • North Hampton
  • Pelham
  • Plaistow
  • Portsmouth
  • Rye
  • Salem
  • Sandown
  • Seabrook
  • South Hampton
  • Stratham
  • Windham
Map of towns in Massachusetts and New Hampshire that Care at Home serves.
people

Our leadership

Executive staff

Our executive management team is made up of talented, focused and highly experienced healthcare professionals who, together with our dedicated board of trustees, are committed exceptional patient care and an inclusive and dynamic workplace culture.

  • President: Patricia O'Brien, MBA, MS, RN
  • Chief Medical Officer: Bernice Burkarth, MD, HMDC, FAAHPM
  • Vice President of Home Health Services: Heidi Landers, RN, BSN, MHA
  • Vice President, Quality, Risk Management and Regulatory Compliance: Donna Beaudin, OT, MBA, CSSBB, NHA, CHC
Family physician Sarwada Tuladhar Jha, MD talking to patient during exam at a clinic appointment and inputting health information at the computer.
Careers

We love it here. We think you will, too

You want to make people’s lives better — yours included — in a career that rewards, challenges and gives you opportunities for growth. Here, you’ll make an impact and build your career, supported by a community of brilliant, compassionate colleagues.

Kathleen Campbell, PT, DPT showing Care at Home patient how to use a walker and teaching best practices for wrist arm care.

Our locations

From regular office visits to inpatient stays, find the healthcare you need and deserve close to home.

Charlotte Grinberg, MD examining hospice patient's heart with a stethocope at Care at Home's High Pointe House.

Our doctors + care team

Meet the doctors and care team devoted to supporting you every step of the way along your path to better health.

Articles
Creature Comfort
August 11, 2023
Mini pony makes therapy visit to former owner at High Pointe House.
Articles
A Renewed Opportunity to Make Ourselves Aware of End-of-life Care
March 21, 2023
In this Boston Globe letter to the editor, Tufts Medicine Care at Home Chief Medical Officer Bernice Burkarth, MD, HMDC, FAAHPM shares her perspective on end-of-life care in light of former President Jimmy Carter’s recent decision to enter hospice care.
Articles
Patricia Finocchiaro, RN, MS Promoted to Clinical Director of Home Health VNA
December 30, 2021
Lawrence, Mass. – Patricia Finocchiaro, RN, MS has been promoted to clinical director of Home Health VNA, a nonprofit service provider of Lawrence-based Home Health Foundation which provides a comprehensive continuum of home health, palliative, hospice, aide and private care services in all the places patients call home.
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