The Future of Senior Living: Software and Data

Keeping Residents Safe

First and foremost, senior living communities are now more more prepared for infectious disease outbreaks or other situations that may affect the health and safety of residents.

The right software solutions - like those from Glennis - can provide the capabilities to not only be alerted as soon as a potential outbreak begins, but also to accurately track, monitor, and manage the outbreak to protect the health and safety of not only residents, but also the staff who care for them.

The Glennis community infection management tool allows you to capture data surrounding symptom tracking, contact tracing, testing results, vaccinations and other infection control factors.

Facilitating Safe and Easy Interaction Between Residents and Their Families

Another massive change the pandemic brought about is how we interact and socialize with our friends and family, with many people relying on digital channels of communication to minimize physical interaction or to stay connected when they can’t be together in person.

Leveraging the right software solution, senior living community operators can provide residents and their families options to stay in contact through digital communication channels.

With the Glennis Solutions Family App, (a 2021 McKnight's Tech Award recipient), senior living community operators can provide families with a platform that enables safe and secure communication with their loved one and the staff caring for them, including important updates about daily care and care history, updates about upcoming events, dining menus, and more.

The convenience of always-on app provides families peace-of-mind at any time from wherever they may be. And for staff, providing direct communication channels for the families of residents not only eases the burden of having to relay communications, but also streamlines any communication they need to have with the family to help guide resident care.

Improve Staff Retention and Hiring

Maybe the most significant impact of the pandemic has been staffing shortages, with many caregivers facing longer days and more residents to care for. This challenge has also brought about an uptick in labor costs due to increased overtime.

According to research conducted by the American Healthcare Association (AHCA) and the National Center for Assisted Living (NCAL), of all the types of facilities within the healthcare sector, long-term care facilities are currently facing the worst labor crisis, with over 82% of assisted living communities currently facing moderate to severe staffing challenges.

This has left senior living operators with two main strategies - improve the productivity of current staff to shortcut the labor shortage while improving staff retention to ensure you have the care providers you need on hand when you need them.

The two strategies are more intertwined than one might think, with technology and data being at the core of both.

By equipping your staff with the right technology that addresses the unique processes of senior living management, you can improve staff productivity by enabling your organization to complete tasks quicker, improve communication, and enable collaboration. Mobile apps like the Glennis care app keep staff with residents, put information at their fingertips, and allow easy documentation of their work.

Other ways that technology can allow you to create a more productive and happier workforce is by improving your scheduling. The Glennis resource balancer tool allows you to assess and fine tune schedules to ensure your staff isn’t overworked and that your labor costs are contained. 

And just as important as improving your ability to retain staff is improving your organization’s abilities to hire the best staff available. Potential candidates will always be on the lookout for forward-thinking organizations that prioritize technology to improve the workday.

The Future of Data in the Senior Living Industry

The importance of acquiring, monitoring and leveraging data to improve all aspects of senior living can’t be overstated.

Glennis Insights brings all the data across your organization into one place, eliminating the need to search for information from different databases and reports. This single source of truth allows teams to easily assess your financial, operational, and resident care performance—both from a community and portfolio level.

Some examples include, but are not limited to, leveraging data to create competitive insights to maximize your marketing budget and increase census, tracking census and apartment pricing to keep occupancy and rates optimized, monitoring of resident care quality and satisfaction levels, and care to billing accuracy.

Real-time data gives you the strategic insight you need to make decisions that have a measurable impact on performance.

Successful senior living communities will need to harness the powerful combination of technology and data to create a top-tier level of resident care that not only ensures the health of your residents, but also empowers your staff and creates a workforce that is productive and happy to stay with your organization for the long-term, no matter what the future of the industry brings along.

To learn more about how Glennis Solutions can help your senior living community achieve an even higher level of performance, schedule a demo today.