Concurrent Sessions D and E

Concurrent Session D

8:00am - 9:30am

Concurrent Session E

9:45am - 11:15am

D01 - Culture Change in Rehabilitation and Sub-Acute Settings:  What a Way to Spend a Day!

Theressia Bufford, MDS Administrative Coordinator Dallas VA-Transitional Care Unit

Joy Solano

Transitioning the team from an old to a new culture takes leadership and vision. The MDS Nurse can be the powerhouse of the agency. As a change agent she can be the biggest cheerleader. At the Dallas VA the MDS nurses have taken on being the culture change gurus. Skill and creativity are crucial to build buy-in and excitement from all staff levels in the work for transforming to a new culture where people look forward to coming and restoring. Adapting restorative nursing to include a complete transformation benefits the patients, staff, family members and all involved. The first course of action is changing attitudes! Subgroup competitions including all disciplines have made the difference in transforming the much-needed transitional care unit into a place of honor for our veterans and their families.

Participants will:

- Identify 3 principles of cultural change as it relates to LTC

- Discuss ways of improving stabilization of staff while improving resident outcomes

- Describe the process used to adapt restorative nursing.

D02 – Leading and Sustaining Person-Centered Care:  It's Everybody's Job

Janice Dabney, Health Care Consultant, Labor Management Project

Ruby Greene, President, RHG Consulting Services

Long-lasting culture change depends on developing leadership at many levels and arming staff with the skills to sustain change over time. In this session, we will introduce you to a pilot project conducted in six New York City nursing homes that equipped both management and direct care staff with skills in leadership development and project sustainability.  Attendees will have the opportunity to participate in several exercises that will challenge them to apply these concepts in their own work setting.  

Participants will:

- Examine one model of Organizational Development and successful project implementation

- Apply the principles of the ADKAR model in understanding one's individual role in organizational change 

D03 – The Soil, The Seed, Getting the Garden to Grow; an Individualized Restorative Process

Michael Libby, Health Dimensions Group

Nancy Maronn, Waukesha Springs Health & Rehabilitation

Sharon Washington, Waukesha Springs Health & Rehabilitation

Waukesha Springs Health & Rehabilitation has designed and implemented an individualized restorative process that has resulted in powerful outcomes for the residents it serves. Come learn about the Soil: why we decided to change; the Seed: our goals and process for engaging all stakeholders; and Getting the Garden to Grow: the process for creating the program from those who were intimately involved in it from the start.

Participants will:

- Learn types of data and information that was a driver for changes
- Explore the steps in initiating and implementing the process

- Discuss successes and challenges including resident outcomes

D04 – Riding the Wave - Creating a Human Habitat

Cheryl George, Education Leader, Sherbooke Community Centre

Just like every elder, every wave is different. Come hear how we crafted our ship to ride the wave to a great life for all. The Sherbrooke Village Model was created at Sherbrooke Community Centre in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan Canada and has been in operation since 1999. This unique design supports Sherbrooke's Mission, Vision and the Eden Alternative philosophy. This presentation will describe a nontraditional approach to the creation and ongoing life of the human habitat using values based decision- making. The Sherbrooke Villages demonstrate a practical, cost-efficient design where residents live in houses for nine or ten people. We will highlight features of the model to demonstrate how loneliness, helplessness and boredom can be alleviated in houses built for those requiring heavy care. We will discuss day-to-day life in a house staffed with multi-skilled workers. The Eden Alternative philosophy grows easily in this setting.

Participants will:

- Learn the importance of values based decision-making.

- Compare the difference between a program and a philosophy.

- Plan incorporation of new ideas into their own work

D05 – Riding the Waves to New Horizons

Laurie Gorski, Assistant Director of Nurses, Teresian House

Resident Centered Care Coordinators from Teresian House Center for the Elderly share their experiences in moving from the traditional to resident-directed service model.  A panel consisting of three former RN Unit Managers, a former Diet Technician, Activities Director and Social Services Director will take you from the planning stages through implementation to current efforts at sustaining change, while sharing their triumphs and challenges.  This will be an interactive presentation, so bring your questions!

Participants will:

- Learn strategies for facilitating, planning, implementing and sustaining culture change 

- Explore triumphs and challenges of this process

D06 - Light Up Your Life - The Critical and Often Unexamined Role of Lighting and Other Design Elements in Creating Quality of Life

Betsey Brawley, President-Environmental Design Consultant, Design Concepts Unlimited

Looking for new ways to increase mobility and social interaction and decrease falls, depression and apathy? Consider the role that lighting and other elements of physical design play in our lives as we age. Good lighting is perhaps the most important and least understood element in designing environments for older adults. It can reduce the incidence of falls, hip fractures and related injuries. It can enhance sleep and quality of life. This presentation is filled with the essential elements for good lighting and good design and is rich with practical take-home ideas from care settings that used lighting to encourage community, social interaction, mobility and personal health. This very interactive and visual presentation will focus on both indoor and outdoor spaces.

Participants will:

- Learn elements of good design that contribute to a more supportive living environment

- Discover aspects of everyday life that can be affected by lighting

- Explore interventions to improve vision and lighting in the care environment

D07 – Meaning and Community; Two Unique Approaches

Janet McNeil Hively, Senior Fellow, College of Continuing Educations

Dace Carver Kramer, Coordinator, Aging Well Program Coordinator

To be able to make meaningful contributions to one's community until one's last breath is a privilege that should be universal.  Dace Carver Kramer will describe her project in northwest Colorado where elders will have housing, services and community involvement in one integrated campus.  Janet will share her vision of civic engagement that is becoming manifest in her new organization, SHIFT: Move to Meaning in Life and Work.  Community contributions by elders will be highlighted from several perspectives.

Participants will:

- Explore an integrated model of housing, services, and community involvement

- Discuss options for civic engagement that inspire and renew elders

- Learn how meaningful work and community involvement will transform elderhood in the new culture of aging

D08 – Nurses and Nursing Home Culture Change

Christine Mueller, Associate Professor, University of Minnesota School of Nursing

Roger Beins, Clinical Services Mentor, Meadowlark Hills

Marilyn Oelfke, Director of Nursing, Perham Memorial Hospital and Home

Does nursing home culture change create a new paradigm for nursing practice? This interactive session will allow the participants to compare and contrast the role of licensed nurses and the director of nursing in traditional and culture change nursing homes. We will also identify characteristics, competencies and skills licensed nurses and directors of nursing need to successfully facilitate and sustain a person-directed model. Directors of nursing from two organizations well on their culture change journeys will explore nursing practice in their respective settings and offer insights.

Participants will:

- Learn nursing characteristics, competencies, and skills needed in a person-directed model

- Discuss roles of licensed nurses and director of nurses in a person-directed environment

D09 – CQI meets CC: Using Continuous Quality Improvement to Support and Document Culture Change

Mary Tellis-Nayak, VP of Quality Initiatives, My Innerview

Many organizations have begun their culture change journey to create person-centered environments. This presentation will describe an approach to chronicle and benchmark the culture change journey through the use of metrics/indicators as well as resident, staff and family satisfaction surveys. The program will demonstrate how an organization can use an existing system, the performance improvement function, to support culture change. Not only does this encourage all departments to focus on person-centered care-giving but it uses existing and new data sources to capture changes in those things we measure: indicators as well as staff and resident satisfaction.

Participants will:

- Discuss the importance of obtaining resident and staff feedback and how this can be used in performance improvement programs

- Learn indicators that can be used to measure progress on a culture change journey

- Discuss examples of successes in this area from listening to panel members and session participants

D10 - Data, Research, Analysis; Documenting Culture Change Process and Lessons

Natalie Ammarell, President, Human Service Systems

Vonda Hollingsworth, SPHR, Pennybyrn at Maryfield

Tonya Rhodes, Household Coordinator, Pennybyrn at Maryfield

Five years ago, the staff of Pennybyrn at Maryfield Health Center embarked on the journey of change from institutional skilled care facility to HOME. This year, our first halls are becoming households and our personal and organizational transformation process is in high gear. The challenge of long-term care culture change is so all-consuming that most facilities don't have the  time, energy or will to think about research or even documenting the personal, organizational and leadership transformation that is taking place daily. In this session, we will discuss Pennybyrn's approach to research and documentation of the extraordinary stories of personal and leadership transformation that are associated with culture change. To extend the culture change movement, we must examine our experience and pass along our learnings to others.

Participants will:

- Discover strategies for documenting culture change progress as it unfolds

- Learn that deep culture change demands significant personal change and individual ownership of the process. We are all leaders

- Explore strategies for fostering and documenting personal empowerment and strategies for research, documentation, tracking progress

D11 – Using Your Story to Change the Culture of Aging

Beth Baker, Journalist and Author

Do you want to help raise awareness about why we need to change the culture of aging? Are you wondering which is the right story to tell – and how to tell it? Long time freelance journalist Beth Baker will draw on her experiences while writing her new book Old Age in a New Age – The Promise of Transformative Nursing Homes to demonstrate what works and what doesn't  in getting your message out to the public. We will discuss how to work with the media and how to creatively reach out to the wider world to have a positive impact on attitudes about aging.

Participants will:

- Identify stories that address common misconceptions about life in nursing homes.

- Develop a specific message or story and discuss ideas for disseminating it

- Summarize a selection of stories through the perspective of a news reporter

D12 – The Spiritual Foundations of Culture Change

Barry Barkan, Co-Director & Co-Founder, Live Oak Institute

Debby Barkan, Co-Director, Live Oak Institute

Live Oak has always rooted culture change in the liberation of the human spirit.  In our Joyful Journey program, we define culture as "the values, practices, rituals and traditions that protect the human spirit and enable it to thrive within an organization."  We champion the human spirit by forging the organizational infrastructure that supports us all to be at home, live our values, heal conflict, give blessings, spread joy, and increase effectiveness in our work and personal satisfaction.  Spirit thrives when all people are known and empowered, when past and future are connected and when hope and meaning are consistently nurtured.  Let's be champions.

Participants will:

- Learn how the enhancement of the human spirit is an essential part of culture change and OBRA '87

- Explore ways to build positive energy within the environment

- Learn strategies for making people from all cultures be at home within the environment

D13 – Living the Heart of Diversity

Brenda Jennings, Neighborhood Coordinator, Providence Mount St. Vincent

What images pop into your head when you hear the word "Diversity?"  If communication breakdowns, frustrated clients and staff prejudice spring to mind first, replace them with shared experiences of personal growth, and integrated workforce, and a rich community life for residents and staff. Come explore approaches to meet the challenges of diversity in a spirit of respect.  We will hear reflections from clients and staff and real life examples/lessons learned from Providence Mount St. Vincent a long-term care community with staff from over 30 countries.  Learn to welcome diversity and transform it from a divisive headache to the heart of your community.

Participants will:

- Identify common diversity challenges in the workplace

- Articulate successful approaches and interventions for diversity related issues

D14 – Changing the Culture of Care: Four Journeys: One Vision

Marlene Fondrick, Consultant, Institute for Family-Centered Care

Heidi Gil, Continuing Care Specialist, Planetree

Bonnie Kantor, Executive Director, The Pioneer Network

Debra Levin, President, The Center for Health Design

Robert Mayer, President, The Hulda B. and Maurice L. Rothschild Foundation

Whether we employ the language of culture change, resident-centered care, relationship-centered care, family-centered care or just "home," many important national organizations are on the journey to transform the continuum of healthcare experiences, from patients in an acute care setting to residents in a chronic care setting. They all share a common set of values, including the creation of opportunities for personal growth, self-expression, and empowerment. They also include recognition of the importance of the natural environment, a supportive built environment, community, and family. While each organization participating in this session has chosen a different path, there is so much to be learned through shared experience. This session will explore those experiences, and opportunities.  Using examples from their individual experiences, the speakers will provide a road map for what it takes to overcome institutional and community barriers to successfully implement innovative practices. Special focus will be on how to establish "the business case" for culture change in a wide variety of settings.

Participants will:

- Recognize the work of four important national organizations, all contributing to our understanding of how we change the culture of care in America

- Discuss opportunities for future collaboration among these organizations

- Learn more about how to work with these national groups to effect change in their own communities

D15 – Eden Principle 7: Medical Treatment Should be the Servant of Genuine Human Caring, Never its Master

Bill Thomas, Founder, Eden Alternative

Come participate in a stimulating and persuasive examination of the use and misuse of prescription medications among older people. In this session, we will connect medical practice issues to broader questions of public priorities, policy goals, ageism and social change. The session will draw on medical case reports, economic data and health system impact and provide a challenge to the professionals in attendance to grapple with these issues in their own practice, teaching and research.  Wasteful, inappropriate, duplicative and conflicting patterns of medication prescription and use do great damage to the economic, physical and psychosocial security of older people. Today's medications are enormously powerful tools that can damage the health and well being of older people as easily as they can help. We need to work toward a future in which medication does as much good and as little harm as possible to the people who use them.

Participants will:

- Learn the great damage that the wasteful, inappropriate and duplicative patterns of medication use do to our Elders

- Explore how today's medications are powerful tools that can damage the health and well being of older people as easily as they can help

D16 – Implementing Culture Transformation  in a Large Diverse System.

Christa Hojlo, Director VA Nursing Home Care, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs owns and operates 133 nursing homes from Puerto Rico to Hawaii. The mission of VA is excellence in the delivery of health care, education, and research. The VA has been recognized as a system where quality of health care and improvement in performance is regarded as critical to the delivery of excellent patient care. The VA has also been recognized as a leader in education, especially medical education and research. As a leader in education and research, the focus is always on improving quality of care. The movement toward culture transformation of the nursing home supports this focus but also places a renewed emphasis on quality of life as well as quality of care. We will learn how the VA has begun implementing the transformation of the culture of nursing home care.

Participants will:

- Explore "paradigm shift" as the basis for the identified stages of transformation

- Learn organizational strengths that provide the impetus for transformation

- Discuss organizational barriers to transformation

E01 – Responding to the Spirit: Integrating Faith and Spirituality into the Culture Change Journey

Julie Berndt, Spiritual Ministries Consultant, The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society

Greg Wilcox, Vice President for Mission Effectiveness and Senior Pastor, The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society

Engaging residents and staff in the nurture and care of their own spirits as well as nurturing others is an important component of the culture change journey.  This session explores the continuing work of the Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society to intentionally integrate faith and spirituality into their organization's culture change work.  The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society is a Christian social ministry organization that seeks to share God's love in lively community settings and through services that support people in their own homes.  In more than 230 locations around the country, Good Samaritan offers Christian Communities of Care in which seniors find many opportunities for a meaningful and full life. There are a host of housing options and services available: from independent living to congregate and assisted living, to skilled nursing with rehabilitation and long-term care. Ideas for responding to and nurturing the Spirit as well as dialogue about the issues surrounding faith and spirituality in the 21st century will form the core of this session.

Participants will:

- Examine components of the Good Samaritan Society's history, mission and hallmark values that have contributed to their intentional focus on faith and spirituality as part of the culture change journey

- Learn methods for encouraging faith and spirituality in the lives of residents and staff

- Discuss issues in current US culture that influence how we care for the faith and spiritual needs of residents and staff

E02 – In Our Own Voices: Going to the Source to Learn how Culture Change Affects Direct Care Workers

Jocelyn Barrett, Project Coordinator, Muskie School of Public Service

Julie Paulsen, CNA

In 2006 the Northern New England LEADS Project hired Jocelyn Barrett to meet with direct care and support workers who had been working toward culture change in their facilities and agencies. The goal was to record the challenges, successes and stories that show how culture change is engaging and affecting key workers on the front lines. In this session we will learn how oral history and use of story can help workers find their voice and their power, hear some of these inspiring tales, and explore answers to the question, "If someone asked you to chronicle your experience of culture change, what are the stories you would tell?"

Participants will:

- Learn how stories chronicle the true nature of work, and how storytelling can play a role in building a sense of community and confidence that is key to culture change

- Explore why it is important that direct care workers have a creative outlet to share their stories about the work they do, the people they help and to gain insights into the culture of an organization

- Explore how their unique experience relates to others who are also working toward culture change, and what they can learn from hearing others' stories

E03 – Self-Scheduling – Can it Work?

Laci Cornielson, Household Coordinator, Meadowlark Hills retirement Community

Jerrie Rieck, CNA/CMA Mentor, Meadowlark Hills Retirement Community

Changing the culture in long-term care means empowering others to act. Self-scheduling empowers team members to have control of their schedules. This session will teach supervisors/leaders how to overcome the challenges of flattening the hierarchy of organizations and how to turn more power over to direct care workers through the process of self-scheduling. This will be practical information about the concept of self-scheduling, challenges in making it work, and strategies to work with teams to make it successful.

Participants will:

- Recognize that self-scheduling flattens hierarchy and brings more control to direct care staff members

- Identify barriers to self-scheduling

E04 – Applying Culture Change in Practice: An Operational Comparison of Traditional, Household and Greenhouse™ Models

Vernon Feather, Vice President, SFCS, Inc.

Lorraine Hiatt, Owner, Planning, Research and Design for Aging

This interactive presentation, given by two experienced professionals with backgrounds in architecture/business and planning/post occupancy research, will explore differences in nursing models, examine four pivotal decisions when designing for culture change and review perceived limitations of the culture change models.  The presenters will conduct a comparative evaluation showing the staffing and operational cost differences between three hypothetical models: an 80-bed traditional facility, 5 to 16-resident households and 8 to 10-elder Greenhouses.  Using case examples and simple graphics, the presenters will discuss four key decisions in making the shift to a culture change model: How is staff reallocated, What are options for dining, How are resident care tasks handled and What happens to resident activities. In addition, we will explore some concerns regarding the flexibility of culture change models to accommodate the lower-modest cost markets and high acuity needs.

Participants will:

- Learn the differences between traditional, household and Greenhouse models and understand their cost implications

- Examine how staff time is allocated, how dining operations vary, how resident care and resident activities differ in the individual models

- Discuss the limitations each model has regarding low or modest cost care

E05 – Transforming Nursing Homes to Better Serve Special Needs Populations

Beth Irtz, Chief Life Enhancement Officer, Pinon Management

Hollie Hoyle, Administrator, Sierra Healthcare Community, Lakewood, CO

Connie Kohl, Nursing Home Administrator, Canon City, CO

The culture change movement has recognized traditional long-term care communities serving the elderly across our nation. But what about other nursing homes residents with special needs?  This session will provide a framework and core principles that a transforming nursing home can adapt to mentally ill or younger residents with chronic diseases. All nursing homes, whomever they serve, can transform. Our panel of long-term care staff will discuss their experiences, best practices and stories of their transformation.

Participants will:

- Explore key elements of a model for transforming a nursing home serving special populations

- Examine the need for boundaries and limits as a key element of that model

- Gain insights from staff working in transformed facilities

E06 – The Spice of Life: Diversity and Creativity in Culture Change

Ayanna Najuma, CEO, GNC Media LLC

Neyna Johnson, Deputy State LTC Ombudsman, IL Dept. on Aging

What does it mean to create equality and fresh opportunity as societal expectations for aging change? Twenty-six percent of Baby Boomers are Hispanic, Black, Asian/Pacific Islander, or Native American. This session explores new visions for aging that are arising through expressions of ethnicity, living in community, and the quest to heighten the spice of life while growing older.

Participants will:

- Explore opportunities for culture change in the coming generation of minority elders

- Identify ways for ethnically diverse elders to have a meaningful role in the communities where they live and worship

- Learn the richness and vitality that ethnic expression brings to the quest for new visions of aging

E07 – A Labor Management Partnership for Person-Centered Care

Christine Bishop, Professor, Brandeis University

Walter Leutz, Associate Professor, Brandeis University

Successful culture change is all about partnerships that work together to achieve person-centered care.  One such example can be found in New York City, where a labor-management partnership exists between the Local 1199 of the Service Employees International Union and a provider organization of the 40 nursing home Continuing Care Leadership Coalition. They came together to form the Quality Care Committee (QCC).  It is the QCC that provides the resources necessary to advance culture change within its partnership's members. Brandeis University and Boston College conducted an 18-month study to learn how well this worked in two nursing homes, and this session will highlight the results.

Participants will:

- Learn facilitators of and barriers to culture change and how labor and management can work in cooperation to implement change

- Discover what elements of labor-management partnership can be replicated in other settings – both unionized and non-unionized

- Discuss the implications of labor-management partnerships for other stakeholders in the long-term care field

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E08 – Culture Change in Presbyterian Homes

Dan Strittmater, Strategic Initiatives Project Manager, Presbyterian Homes and Services, Inc.

Kathy Yechout, Community Coordinator, Presbyterian Homes of Roseville

Presbyterian Homes has been working for almost ten years toward culture change in multiple care centers. You are invited to learn about the challenges and strategies of managing this process in a multi-campus organization. A panel of central office and campus staff will discuss what they have learned through this process. The panel will facilitate a discussion specifically related to culture change in organizations with multiple care centers.

Participants will:

- Learn the challenges of transitioning to person-centered care in a multi-campus organization.

- Examine successful as well as unsuccessful strategies implemented by Presbyterian Homes

E09 – One Organization's Journey Towards Compassionate Care of the Dying

Clari Gilbert, Sr. VP of Operations, Beth Abraham Health Services

Dolores L. D'Agostino, Executive Director, InnerAction Plus, Inc.

This session describes an innovative end-of-life care initiative within the culture change process. Through experiential activity, participants will explore the need for change in traditional end-of-life care.  We will learn how one organization accomplished this through integrating diverse personal and cultural perspectives towards death and dying, introducing appropriate care giving practices and behavior at the end of life.  There will be open discussion of the challenges of new cultural and behavioral patterns in end of life care

Participants will:

- Explore the limits of end-of-life care as it is currently happens in many traditional long-term care settings

- Learn new practices related to personal comfort levels with facing death and dying

- Discuss the need for a team approach in end-of-life care

- Discover ways staff can overcome barriers to Compassionate Care of the Dying

E10 – Green Houses ®; Making Spaces in Small House Nursing Homes Work

Lois Cutler, Research Associate, University of Minnesota

Robert Jenkens, Vice President, NCB Capital Impact

Green Houses® (GH) are small houses in residential neighborhoods, with all the features of home, including working kitchens.  A collection of GHs is a licensed nursing home. The challenge is to plan, design and furnish the spaces to achieve a truly individual home for residents, a gathering place for visitors and a functional workplace for staff while meeting nursing home regulations. We will also explore replication projects as a flexible template for a variety of housing communities.

Participants will:

- Learn how private and public spaces work for all

- Explore the data collection processes used in analyzing the GH spaces

E11 – Sharing the Vision: Building Momentum and Sustaining it with your Board and Leadership

Robert Meiss, President/CEO, Beechwood Continuing Care

When it comes to culture change, a Board of Directors or Management Team is no different than any other group. Some are easily convinced others need convincing. This session will walk you through the process undertaken at Beechwood Continuing Care in Buffalo New York. Experience how culture change was introduced, and most importantly, how momentum was created and continues to grow.

Participants will:

- Learn that all people have different routines and habits

- Learn the steps used to inform the board and leadership and to build understanding

- Contrast your organization's mission with reality

- Explore the differing roles and responsibilities of the board and staff leadership

- Discuss the importance of continual communication and resident, family and staff involvement

E12 – What makes a house a home?  Rakhma's Proven Model for Memory Care in a Home Setting

Janelle Johnson, Executive Director, Rakhma Homes

Shirley Shaw, Board Member Emeritus, Rakhma Homes

What makes a house a home and why does it matter for those with memory loss?  There's lots of talk these days about the "household model" and its benefits, especially for those with memory loss.  This session will explore the elements of an experienced and successful program where the intimacy and familiar setting of a house have proven to offer a sense of well being – a place to know and be known – even in the advanced stages of memory loss.  Learn the essential elements of the Rakhma program and explore ways to incorporate this proven model into your own setting.

Participants will:

- Learn the history of a successful residential care home model

- Explore the benefit of providing care in a small home environment

- Learn the essential program elements of a successful residential memory care home

E13 – Dining Your Way- Sustainable Change

Sandy Burrows, Director of Quality of Life, Golden Clinical Services

Cindy Dunivent, Director of Nutritional Services, Golden Clinical Services

This session will be a conversation about sustainable change that is designed and directed by the residents.  In a person-directed care environment, quality of life for the residents can be improved by designing the dining experience in many different ways.  From Russian-style dining to buffet to family-style dining, there are many configurations that will make a real difference to someone moving into a care community or one who has been in that community for years.  In addition to dining service changes, creating social connections and honoring individual choice will be highlighted in the pictures, conversations, poems and stories of residents who have experienced a renewal of life

Participants will:

- Explore the features of home and personal choices they would make in defining what "makes a difference in my day."

E14 – The Smart Home – Innovative Today, Expected Tomorrow

Jack York , Owner, It's Never 2 Late

The concept of the "smart home" means many things to many people.  It can instill fear of a loss of privacy or help the dream of promoting independence.  This session will demonstrate what types of technologies are available in setting up smart homes, and how they can impact senior living communities and individuals in the future. A Volunteers of America assisted living community in Minneapolis will share the process and outcomes of integrating smart technology into their community.

Participants will:

- Learn aspects of a of "smart house"

- Explore data-backed outcomes from a Minnesota community that has embraced a smart house model

- Test smart house technology in action

E15 – An In-Room Medication System- Freedom From Carts… PRICELESS!

Denise Ellis, Clinical Coordinator, Perham Memorial Hospital and Home

Teresa Stoderi, Lead Nurse, Perham Memorial Hospital and Home

The Medication Cart is one of the first things that must go when converting to the household model of care. To support residents to rise at will, a 6 am med pass will not work. The system should be flexible enough to work within the resident's individual routine. Learn how to adapt the medication system by eliminating medication carts and moving medications to resident rooms. It can be done with any medication system and is inexpensive to implement. This system results in benefits to residents and allows nurses to spend more time with residents.

Participants will:

- Learn the benefits of an in-room medication system

- Learn to plan, design, and implement an in-room medication system on a limited budget

- Explore how timing of the med pass can be flexible enough to meet each individual resident's routine

E16– Societal Transformations in the 21st Century as a Result of the Aging of the Boomers.

Andrew Lee Alden, Project Designer, Engberg Anderson Design Partnership

Edward jj Olson, President, EjjOlson and Associates

This presentation will profile the dramatic influence the Baby Boom generation will have on the planning and delivery of aging services.  We will also explore societal changes that will create a sustainable environment, prioritizing adaptable and renewable technologies and energy-efficient policies.  We will identify goals for integrating aging services over the next 20 years and address how communities will look in the future, as Baby Boomers grow older.

Participants will:

- Explore the impending impact of the boomer generation on provision of services and the corresponding changes in design and technology

- Identify current and future models of care, which will adapt to meet the demand for aging in community services