TECHNOLOGY & SOFTWARE


The Growth of Care Home Tech


Liam Mynes, from Tork manufacturer Essity, looks at how technology is smartening up the care home – and considers how it can also help to improve cleaning and hygiene.


The revolution began slowly. And it started with minor breakthroughs such as electronic records and zoom meetings.


But then care home technology really began to take off. We now see it everywhere: for example, acoustic monitoring is increasingly being used to detect differences in noise levels of in residents’ bedrooms, alerting staff members to activities such as choking, getting out of bed and unusual levels of restlessness.


Smart watches and other wearables are also being used to monitor heart rate, skin temperature and blood oxygenation levels. These can also be employed to track dementia sufferers who might leave the care home and become lost.


Artificial intelligence is being used to identify signs of pain in people who are unable to communicate their suffering to others. Systems such as PainChek use a smartphone’s camera to analyse people’s faces and identify signs of pain from facial movements.


At the same time, robots are gradually being introduced into care homes, particularly in the Far East.


For example, robots deployed in Japan over the past few years have included Hug, designed for liſting residents; Paro, a seal-shaped robot that provides animal therapy; and Pepper, a humanoid robot that runs exercise sessions.


“Artificial intelligence is being used to identify signs of pain in people who are unable to communicate their suffering to others.”


In June 2023 it was announced that China is planning to deploy hundreds of robots over the coming years to help look aſter its ageing population and plug a 1.7 million staffing gap.


However, care home robots are still in their infancy and the market has yet to take off. But one area in which robots – and technology in general – is proving particularly useful is in the cleaning sector. Automated systems can now take on the most difficult cleaning tasks, freeing up staff to tackle the more detailed work.


As familiarity with smart solutions increases, the stage opens up for other solutions that can make life easier for care homes amid staff shortages and infection concerns.


For example, Tork Vision Cleaning is increasingly being used in care facilities. Tork Vision Cleaning uses people-counters


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and connected dispensers to provide real-time data on cleaning requirements. This allows care teams to stay ahead of the game and use a smartphone, tablet or computer to remotely check on which dispensers are running low and which washrooms are receiving high levels of traffic. They can then anticipate situations in which enhanced cleaning or extra checks might be required.


Good training is vital to ensure that care home staff and cleaners understand the importance of proper cleaning and hygiene. Research from Essity reveals that 58 per cent of cleaning staff in care homes say they find it challenging to follow all the required steps and tasks in cleaning guidelines. And 68 per cent of employees claim they would like to receive better and more interactive training in hand hygiene.


Essity offers two free online training solutions for care home staff. Tork Cleaning Training for Long Term Care Homes provides employees with ‘real world’ cleaning scenarios in a safe virtual world. The training has been developed in collaboration with the Association for Healthcare Environment and can be customised to fit with local cleaning guidelines.


The second module, Tork Clean Hands Training for Long Term Care Homes, equips staff members with the day-to-day skills they require to secure hand hygiene at every moment. It has been developed with leading hygiene experts using the WHO My Four Moments for Hand Hygiene in a residential home environment. And the interactive simulation – which has been designed to make hand hygiene learning more inspiring - is available both online and in a virtual reality format.


It is only a matter of time before technology becomes more commonplace than ever in the care home. And this will be a huge benefit to everyone since it will help to improve outcomes and free up staff members’ time for more human interactions.


www.tork.co.uk/longtermcare www.tomorrowscare.co.uk


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