Staff management


While the priority is to provide a great care environment, running a care home is also a business. This means operational changes need to unlock compelling commercial benefits.


Beyond maximising staff time and directing care resource to the residents that need it most, digital tools provide ways of ensuring homes are better run, less exposed to risk and more attractive to residents and families.


With a more stable team of carers, less management time is spent recruiting. Digital care homes are often better rated than local counterparts. Indeed among users of our Mobile Care Monitoring system 94 per cent are rated either good or outstanding by the CQC. With admissions down across the sector as a result of Covid-19, improved rankings could make a huge difference and see operators spending less time worrying about occupancy levels.


Part of the attraction to families is the transparency provided by homes that use digital, data generating tools. By allowing relatives on the outside to log in and check on the care of their elderly family member, our Relatives Gateway tool has increased 50 per cent in usage during the pandemic. We expect this to continue in the aftermath of the crisis as families look for ever more transparency and assurance.


Adopting digital reporting further means there is less risk to your care business. Because records are time stamped, the audit trail is far more reliable if you ever need to challenge a claim made against you. This makes digital evidencing an asset that protects your very ability to operate.


Conclusion


It is my hope that the care sector will emerge from the coronavirus pandemic with a renewed sense of pride, confidence, and accomplishment. What has been achieved in terms of lives saved, quality care provided and outcomes delivered in the most challenging circumstances has been nothing short of miraculous – particularly given that so much of the sector runs on paper. Looking ahead, I see a huge amount we can do to build on the experience gained


fighting Covid-19 and further improve the lives of care residents and care workers. Much of this depends on data.


Data upholds the ability of care homes to improve provision, experience, outcomes and commercial viability. And the more data our industry builds from the ground up, the more attention it will get from government to improve yet further.


As we emerge from this terrible pandemic, providers impressed by others who have used technology to its full potential during Covid-19, should be encouraged to become part of a ground- up, sector-wide movement to digitise care evidencing and care planning systems.


Mobile care monitoring systems capable of gathering high-quality data can be installed at most care homes in just 24 hours meaning the benefits are quick to embed.


If adopted more widely, providers will see efficiencies that save time and money. As well as helping the sector to improve outcomes and work more closely with the NHS, it would enable it to put people and passion back in the driving seat of care. The potential of that is truly limitless.


Mobile care monitoring systems capable of gathering high-quality data can be installed at most care homes in just 24 hours meaning the benefits are quick to embed


36


Jonathan Papworth TCHE


Jonathan Papworth, co-founder and director of Person Centred Software, has been involved in social care technology for over 20 years, initially as a professional software developer and then co-founded Person Centred Software with brother Simon in 2013. Papworth is passionate about digital transformation in social care and using technology to support care homes, carers, residents and their families. Person Centred Software’s digital care system, Mobile Care Monitoring, is now used by 1,800 care homes and helps carers across the country digitally record more than 3m care notes as they happen every day.


www.thecarehomeenvironment.com • July 2020


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48