Trusting qualified healthcare professionals to look after relatives requires a big leap of faith. In this context, the BBC found that nearly 1 in 5 English care homes were rated as ‘requiring improvement’ or ‘inadequate.’
What does this say about the state of elderly and social care in the UK? In the programme it is stated how one Cheshire care home, an elderly woman suffered 32 falls in less than one year. Her daughter wrote to social services, believing that without urgent changes to care quality, her mother ‘was going to die.’
Nearly half a million seniors live in UK care homes, and the demand for quality care homes will likely increase as the population ages. Care homes must be the safest they can be and are set up to deliver the highest quality care possible.
Justine Abson, Head of Marketing at Radar Healthcare has presented insights into the benefits of equipping care homes with the latest healthcare technology.
Abson says that according to one study, people in care homes are actually three times more likely to fall than those who are living at home. This may be because care home residents are typically older, frailer, and have limited mobility.
Abson states that falls are the number one cause of emergency hospital admissions for older people. They have the potential to cause serious physical injuries including bone fractures and dislocation, skin wounds (cuts, bruises, surface burns), as well as potentially dangerous head injuries.
Falling can also result in severe psychological consequences including loss of confidence and self-esteem, increased dependency on others, and social withdrawal. To reduce the frequency of falls, it’s important to both prevent the risk of falls and effectively manage them when they do occur.
There are solutions. Emerging technologies like artificial intelligence can benefit efforts to strengthen fall prevention. With AI, care providers can analyse patient data patterns to identify those who are most high-risk for falling. Using these insights, healthcare organisations can be equipped to establish proactive measures and timely interventions to enhance patient safety.
Along with effective risk management software, this approach can also be used to prevent other common physical harms such as pressure sores, choking, and side effects linked to certain forms of prescribed medication.
These devices include items like smartwatches, smart activewear, and biosensors. Different types help with tracking a variety of health indicators such as heart rate, sleep levels and fitness levels,which can then be stored as data for longer-term analysis and tracking.
Healthcare practitioners, Abson finds, can then review the most updated health information possible and adapt the use of this technology to monitor crucial factors, such as blood pressure, heart rate, and glucose levels.
Tech-integrated activewear is also available in all different types, shapes, and sizes, including shirts and shoes. Wearing smart activewear can help individuals measure different indicators as they maintain a healthy level of daily physical activity.
Cultivating a compliant, competent workforce
Health and social care professionals in care homes often carry a lot of responsibilities and heavy workloads, so it’s vital to bolster staff with an effective system for task management and updating patient data as and when needed.
For instance, notes Abson, a real-world application could be addressing medication maladministration. According to one study, every day 7 out of 10 residents were subject to at least one form of medication error. No one wants to make mistakes, so it’s important to create an effective attitude around reporting these errors.
This culture-building includes encouraging staff to immediately report medicine-related mistakes, record accurate details of incidents, and establish a robust process of sharing learned lessons across the organisation.
These efforts can be driven forward by utilising software specifically designed for incident reporting, document management, and improving staff access to information. Streamlining these processes supports positive record-keeping habits, allowing staff to learn from the past and from others, to enhance their delivery of care.
