Standards of care and the demand for greater comforts in senior living communities have evolved consistently over the years in order to better provide for each individual resident. As the space continues to grow and change, so too does the technology needed to support and enhance the experience of not only your residents, but your staff who help to provide for them. Now more than ever, it's important to have a holistic understanding of how your organization uses technology, as well as a strategic technology roadmap to better understand how you will push this strategy forward in order to provide quality care for your senior living community residents both now and in the future.
Where to focus your technology budget
Knowing what your staff should be focusing on to help improve the lives of your residents is vital to creating the best experience in your community. Technology budgets can go towards directly improving the care of your residents by providing them with tangible benefits as well as improving the efficiency of your staff, ensuring they have more time to spend taking care of and engaging with your community. Your technology strategy should be inclusive of baseline technology infrastructure needs in order to set your community up for success in the implementation of any new and innovative technologies that will differentiate your organization from the rest. Some of the areas of innovation your communities should be considering include:
Resident engagement applications
Resident engagement applications are becoming an expectation in any senior living community and can serve a variety of different functions in connecting residents to their family members and staff. Most notably, these applications provide communication outlets, activity management and information broadcast to residents.
With many older adults in residence across the U.S. having spent more time in social isolation from their peers, offering better care for your senior residents through the use of smart devices, applications and other methods can help them connect better. These methods can help with social interaction, connecting with a family member or loved one, healthcare and medication management while also providing games and other activities. Resident engagement is an important method for providing better care outcomes and a better reputation for your community.
Staffing
The great resignation of 2022 has created opportunities for innovation in hiring and recruiting staff. Several new systems have come on the market to address the surge in staffing demand. Many of these applications function as "gig worker" opportunities with same day pay. These applications typically perform background checks and other pre-hire qualifications, and allow communities to hire as needed, or even direct hire, from the applications.
Smart Homes
Smart Home technology is becoming more innovative and affordable. A switch can be installed in an apartment that can service up to 250 iOT devices. Examples of iOT devices include thermostats, lighting control, active monitoring of movement in the apartment, electronic locking, lighting up a path to the bathroom at night, smart pill dispensers, medic alert tech, and robotic cleaners, to name a few. Smart Home technology can also be used for wellness check-ins as well as falls monitoring. Most Smart Home technology integrates with voice recognition software such as Alexa.
Telehealth and Falls Prevention Technology
Telehealth can be most useful for specialty visits, such as psychiatry, or in rural areas. Use of telehealth visits can reduce hospital admissions. In addition, innovative falls prevention technology that utilizes artificial intelligence to scan a room every 30 seconds to predict behavior based on known data. These technologies can detect a fall sometimes as quickly as within one minute. There have been case studies completed that detail fall prevention of 80% or more by utilization of these types of technologies.
Robotics and Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Use of robotics is becoming more commonplace, especially as we continue to see challenges in the labor market. Robotics can be used for telehealth, food service, medication dispersion, cleaning, pet therapy and robotic companions.
Sales and Marketing Tools
A differentiating marketing process is more important than ever as the senior living industry looks to regain occupancy and compete in this constantly growing market. Focus your marketing efforts on the top of the funnel and align with your sales team for an effective transition of qualified leads in the middle of the funnel. With lead attribution and automated marketing campaigns, you can easily track the ROI on your marketing efforts and inform your overall sales and marketing strategy. In addition, the use of virtual sales assistants, live chat and assessments on your website, along with video storytelling applications can help you engage in a creative and more meaningful way with your prospective residents and their family members.
How to better implement new technologies for your community
It's clear that senior living communities are facing a technology gap between where they wish they could be, and what they are currently capable of implementing for themselves. In order to bridge that divide, changes must be made in how organizations approach the procurement, deployment and continued service of their technologies. One of the best ways that any senior living community can make the most out of its technology budget is to create a strategic technological roadmap supported by an internal steering committee to help ensure that transformational change is done at a steady and well considered pace. Creating a well governed and proactive roadmap can assist communities in:
- Assessing where your current technology stands and using that to determine a ranked priority system for where your organization needs technological transformation the most.
- Balancing your budgetary needs with technological growth by ensuring that the most important technology projects are focused on first and without distraction.
- Implementing new technologies by creating set goals for success that have clear metrics, such as adoption rate, better care outcomes and usage statistics.
- Supporting your organization's usage of new technologies after implementation to ensure widespread staff adoption and usage by your residents.
Creating a technological assessment, building out a roadmap and implementing a steering committee can seem like a tall order for any organization, let alone one that may already have limited resources in driving innovation for their community. This can be overcome by working with a technology partner who has extensive experience in providing for senior living communities. By using an MSP who understands your organization's unique needs, you can work with them to identify, implement and maintain new technologies for your organization.
About Parasol Alliance
We are more than just a provider of managed IT services; we are a partner for your community's long-term goals. We've focused solely on ensuring that senior living communities can get the most out of their technology, helping their staff focus on what matters most – assisting their community's residents.
Our years of delivering managed services and information technology to senior living communities has given us the knowledge to provide in-depth technological assessments and roadmaps for your community, helping you implement and maintain new technology. We pride ourselves in tailoring our services to your specific needs and budgets, enabling your community with technology solutions to meet your business goals and empower your care team. If you'd like to learn more about how your community can benefit from our expertise, contact us today.
