This manual is designed to assist persons who desire to become a personal caregivers for persons with disabilities.  The manual can be distributed by agencies and businesses that recruit and/or hire personal attendants/caregivers the want to serve persons with disabilities that live independently within the community.  The goal of this manual is to train any qualified individual about how to become a personal caregiver/attendant for persons that need assistance from outside resources.  These individuals may include families with a child with an illness/disability, parents or guardians with a teenage that needs extra assistance from a hired caregiver, consumers that live and work in their communities, and older persons that require additional assistance while living within their own home.  For the purpose of this manual, caregiver and attendant will be used interchangeably.

          The manual, with other resources, can serve as a guide for those individuals that seek to find quality jobs as personal care attendants.  This manual addresses issues of where to search for employment as personal attendants.  This guide covers issues such as the 3 B's (Be on Time, Be Courteous, and Be Willing to Work), health and safety needs for caregivers and consumers, and ethical situations while on the job.  The process of recruiting personal attendants may require advising from outside resources such as an agency.  This process should be in collaboration between the service provider, the applicant that is seeking employment as a caregiver, and the person needing personal attendants.  All efforts involved in the recruitment of personal attendants should reflect the caregiver, the consumer, and the service provider as they move forward to the hiring process.