Alvita Home Care

About Alvita Home Care

Our founder, Tracy Ongena, never dreamed she would start a health care company when she had a passion for business and was studying economics. As she was working in New York on Wall Street, her grandmother started to call less and less. Tracy started to notice that her sentences didn’t always make sense and she would repeat herself frequently. Tracy sensed something was going on but thought Nana was invincible so she rationalized her behavior to poor sleep. Tracy thought: “How could Nana need help? She has lived 85 years working and running the family farm. She’s Superwoman”. In the winter of 2008, Tracy went home for Thanksgiving and found her Nana asleep on the couch with clutter everywhere. Nana’s house was always meticulous, not a thing out of place and the floors so clean you could eat off of them. Now she saw Nana and couldn’t tell the last time she had showered. She quickly learned she had stopped collecting the mail and it was being held at the post office. Tracy was immediately called to action. This personal experience was the catalyst for Tracy to leave a career on Wall Street and bring her experience in Iowa to help seniors in New York. Tracy sets herself as an example to her staff, promoting her philosophy and mission of “care without compromise“. This is the ethic upon which Alvita Care was established, to raise the standard of excellence for home health aides in New York. In honor of her grandmother’s experience she founded this company on the belief that seniors can and should live fulfilling and independent lives in their own homes while remaining connected to their community. In 2012, we changed our name from Home Life Health Care to Alvita Care in order to better reflect the unique perspective we bring to the home care industry. The origin of our new name “Alvita” literally means “to life.” For us, this better reflects our commitment to improving the quality of life for each and every one of our clients. At Alvita Care, our mission is simple: to improve the quality of peoples’ lives, help them maintain their independence and protect their dignity by providing each client with the highest quality personal home care while projecting a positive, caring and fulfilling working environment for our staff. To further this mission, we communicate in an open and honest way within all our relationships and aim to be as straightforward as possible in all our communications. We are all about fostering an active and positive environment where both caregivers and clients feel self-valued, respected and have a say in voicing their concerns. We recognize our clients as human beings; individuals that deserve to be treated with respect and dignity. We offer a customized care service to reflect these values.