Better Communication Leads to Better Care

Senior living communities are not always ideal environments for clear and complete communication. Individual staff roles can be vague or fluid depending on staffing levels—requiring caregivers to work faster or with more residents than would be ideal. When emergencies arise, caregivers are drawn away from their regular tasks causing abbreviated interactions with other residents. And vitally, not everyone working in a community will have the same definition of ‘good communication.’

Unfortunately, failing to communicate effectively can lead to a wide range of issues. It could be something minor such as caregivers duplicating a routine resident service. Or it could be a more severe neglect of service resulting in serious medical, and potentially legal, consequences.

Regardless of severity, frequent or significant miscommunications can impact the business side of a community as well. It can give families the impression that a senior living community is not well-informed enough to respond to the needs of their loved ones. And if a community isn’t living up to that expectation, it may result in families looking elsewhere for senior care services.

Better communication is key to better communities

Effective communication does more than alleviate problems, it creates benefits that a community can build on.

• It helps ensure that residents are safe and getting the care they need—that’s good for residents, it’s reassuring for families, it extends the length of stay and increases occupancy.
  
  
• Good communication also tends to reduce unnecessary requests and complaints from residents. Complaints can become a big problem for caregivers if residents begin to feel that a complaint is the only way to get attention.
  
  
• In an emergency, teams that can communicate well under pressure, help residents achieve better outcomes.
  
  
• Clear and complete communication can help move a senior living community into a more proactive stance, allowing it to anticipate problems and prevent them from occurring or at least minimize their impact.
  
  
• Staff members feel more competent and confident in their abilities and enjoy a less stressful work environment when they have ready access to the information or assistance they need.

Technology helps unlock better communication

While good communication starts with the efforts of the communicator, effective communication cannot be the responsibility of humans alone. Resident safety technology plays a critical role in improving the effectiveness of information sharing.

CarePoint 6.2, the latest version of Philips’ central monitoring software, is an excellent case in point. It uses wireless devices strategically placed throughout a community to receive, process, and identify alerts, including those related to fall detection and controlled access wander management. Download the datasheet here. Using CarePoint, communities can achieve: 

• Enhanced resident care. When alerts are received from Philips personal help buttons, the CarePoint system promptly informs staff members through their mobile devices and pagers about resident needs, including where the resident is located within the community.
  
  
• Improved operational visibility. Email notifications provide executive oversight with configurable zone escalation. 
  
  
• Easy-to-use staff communication tools. CarePoint’s Notifier mobile app facilitates communication among staff and provides on-demand notification capability, so operators can quickly message staff at any time. Using the intuitive touch screen display, a caregiver can: accept an alert, help the resident as needed, post updates, or escalate the alert for additional help or defer the alert to another caregiver.
  
  
• Greater ease of integration. Enhancements to the software make it even simpler to integrate with other resident safety systems and devices like smoke detectors, pressure pads, pull cords, and nurse call cords providing a greater level of visibility in the community, which can help improve communication.

These capabilities serve to build a solid foundation that enables more effective communication among staff members.