[0:00] Welcome to Artful aging with your host Amy are you a senior or caregiver of a senior looking for support and Direction best-selling author educator and expert in Senior Living Amy Friesen is here
with the help you need while providing you with an important and valuable support,
so now please welcome the host of Artful aging Amy Friesen.
[0:30] Hello and welcome to Artful aging with Amy I'm your host Amy Friesen and we are on Bold Brave TV,
I'm today's episode It's All About innovators in the seniors Housing Industry and frankly I'm sure that this show
and upcoming ones just like it are going to be my favorite because I love to see,
the industry change and develop because I love the Senior Housing Industry and I love when new blood comes into the industry and young entrepreneurs join the game so I'm really excited for today's episode.
My first guess is the founder and c.e.o. of upside home the first and only.
Fully managed living option that uses technology to support and simplify access to Quality housing and services.
[1:15] Jake Rothstein is first realized that there was a substantial need for not only,
not only for upside home but honestly for an entire industry shake-up I would say when he co-founded a previous company called Papa
which pairs older adults and families with companionship and services Jake it's so nice to have you joining us welcome,
Amy thank you so much for that very nice introduction it's really great to be here.
Well I'm as I said I'm very excited to have you on Jake as you know I to run a business in the senior living industry so needless to say when I heard about upside home I was thrilled to chat more about it with you we've had previous conversations as well so,
I hunted you down as fast as I could find you but.
This unique take on Senior Living is super attractive to many independent seniors as well as seniors who need some services but who want to remain in an apartment like setting.
[2:09] Jake I know I briefly just touched about you know what you're up to but could you tell everyone a little bit more about upside home and how you came up with the.
[2:18] Yeah absolutely so we are building the biggest Senior Living key in the world without laying a single brick that's kind of our field.
And we do it by utilizing existing multifamily infrastructure replace older adults in these units we wrap around a layer of services all access through a single simple point of.
And we give people a variety of channels to access those services with so if they're comfortable with an app for their comfortable with a cell phone or the computer with a text or an email.
They have a variety of channels and modalities to be able to access that and we found that really important one was actually one of the early lessons that we had from Papa when we had built.
The first iteration of our Papa app and very few people in their 70s and 80s downloaded it so.
Learning from previous experience has been helpful in accelerating upside home so but to get started and how we got started was really based on a family needs so.
[3:08] Similar to the way we started Papa based on my grandfather we started upside home based on my grandmother and my grandfather had moved into traditional Senior Living he was.
Now I'm he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's and my grandmother mother moving into a Memory Care community.
And she was 87 and just all of a sudden found herself completely alone.
But in otherwise perfect health she had been caring for him for the last you know few years on her own and she was just like now this new person right at 87 she had this new life ahead of her.
Because she didn't have to deal with the burden of his care anymore because now he was in this community.
And so but she found herself in this big house that they built together and she had just finished having knee replacement surgery so she was having trouble walking up and down the stairs.
[3:53] And so we said okay well this big house doesn't make sense for her anymore she's otherwise in perfect health but you can't manage all this stuff the,
maintenance and the repairs and the grocery shop like all this stuff that she was you know trying to manage so we sold her house and we moved her into an apartment in the same neighborhood neighborhood she knew and loved the neighborhood where she had friends and family around where she knew her CBS and her
our pharmacist in her her doctors and,
I became this person that she came to for everything I was the person she came through everything before but now I continue to be this person that you came to for the household things things like rides to a doctor or things like,
driving at night or things like grocery shopping she couldn't pick up the 24 pack of water bottles from the grocery store shelf so I had to go with him.
Anyway long story short we said okay well my grandmother is now in an apartment and I'm doing all this management of stuff for her.
And she is incredibly independent she doesn't need help with care she doesn't really need help toileting and showering and eating.
Can you talk with a little things the iadl type of support instrumental activities of daily living and.
That was like the spark we said okay there must be Millions more people like my grandmother.
And we actually started the business based on this modeling around this golden girl that's idea of Golden Girls houses.
Let's do this in single family homes at spare older adults that are compatible with each other but I mean single family homes and then manage the entire experience for them and energy whole entire process for them.
[5:18] And we quickly realize that that was a very hard approach to scale in single phase single family homes first of all.
[5:25] Finding a lot of them that met our specific criteria around quality was challenging.
And and it was hard to get the amenities that people wanted we were you know we had spun up a couple of ads on Google and Facebook and,
people are calling us in like well you have a gym that you have to have a pool they have security is maintenance included all of these different things that people that are younger older adults and active older adults really.
But then we're having trouble providing in the confines of her traditional single-family home so we started working with the farming communities in the multifamily space and and here we are.
[5:59] And then gets fantastic I again I was still excited when you and I came across each other so I'm just waiting for you to get to Canada for us so we'll get there I know you will for sure and can you tell me like what your vision is going forward.
Yeah so we want to be the big I said the biggest Senior Living Community in the world without laying a single brick so sort of what Airbnb did to the hotel industry we'd like to do for this,
preet almost like a pretty Senior Living so we work actually very nicely and very.
Synergistically with traditional Senior Living because our solution is incredibly independent there's you know ninety percent of people say that they want to age in place right but.
[6:39] Typically due to some sort of trigger event it becomes impractical but it doesn't necessarily mean that they're ready or need assisted living or Memory Care.
And so we said well there's probably something in between the time that a person who you know has their kids move out to college and the house that they raise them in to the time that they need traditional senior living and Care in a very care driven Senior Living.
And that's the solution that we want to be we want to fit in that 90% so 10 Senior Living has 10%,
of the market we want to we want to fit into that 90% and almost get people,
on a path towards senior living but do it in a much more transitional much more much easier type of way.
[7:18] Yeah sometimes with with our independent seniors they're going like you said from a home and then all of a sudden they're going to community right retirement long-term care depending on what it is and it can be a shock especially for,
people that are moving for reasons like,
nutrition or stairs or things like that and so lots of retirement offer independent,
but a lot of the people in the community still see retirement as Retirement not like as a retirement home as opposed to an independent senior community and so there's definitely
you know they definitely have it in the retirement but I think that this
speaks to a larger amount of people who are looking for that apartment style because not and don't forget like a lot of retirement who do have independent.
Are also in the don't have the apartment style like it's still.
You know still maybe like half kitchens or still you know not as big as space and things like that so this is why I was so interesting to come across you
yeah you know it's interesting you say that the half kitchens like one of the things that people come to us with is their dining room tables they come to us and they're like well wait Department going to be big enough for our dining room table because dining room tables associated with family and community and,
how many countless,
Christmas dinners and Thanksgiving dinners have people how to run their dining room tables this is where the memories have been made over the past however many years and that is one thing that people really want to hold on to so.
[8:46] We can enable that right we have a lot of options we can give people a lot of options in terms of space and just lay out in geography and floor plan and mode whatever it might be.
In order to have people continue to hold on to those things that are so important to them the other thing I'd say like one of the things that makes us really special.
Is the idea that we're intergenerational so many people come to us.
And I say I am stuck in this eighty eight year olds body and I feel like I'm 25 at heart and I don't want to be in it I'm not ready to be in a community of all,
70 and 80 and 90 year olds.
I love you know to be mixed in with people of all ages and so we are able to offer that you know all the benefits of traditional you know,
independent senior living but with all of the positive impacts of having people that have early ages around you.
[9:34] Yeah I think it's especially special right it's you know being able to do that.
Amongst you know either like young adults depending on the community right young adults or ones with children depending on what it is that everybody has a different taste of what they want.
And it's nice to be able to have that variety and like you said with the dining room table everyone wants to bring their dining room table and you know lots of times we can fit in in retirement homes but,
more often than not we don't write more often we're trying to downsize it because physically they may not use it anymore or physically it's just really.
Great so but like you said they making memories and that's why.
[10:15] 100% And one of the other things that we have the ability to be flexible with is couples right so we get a lot of people coming to us that.
You know husband and wife or just significant others and.
One of them might be a little bit higher Acuity and need some supplemental care and the other one is totally fine and you know still mobile and still active and still very energetic.
And so for both of them to move into a traditional Al doesn't make a lot of sense.
But for them to move together into one of our fully managed units where one person might be receiving some supplemental care for help with ADLs and the other one can listen to the independent independently in a regular apartment community.
That's a big benefit and that's a big benefit for the residents themselves and for their family members.
[10:59] Can you tell us a little bit more you know I'm a senior living in one of these communities what does that look like because you had mentioned that you know could be on an app it could be on the phone call you know is it a concierge type service can you wrap our heads around it a bit.
Yeah so we have a whole catalog essentially of services that we wrap around Apartments things like food and transportation and companionship and assistance provided by Papa,
but also things like community events and activities we have curated events in all of our geographies now.
That enable people to participate in activities and experiences we like to call them with people that are like-minded whether they live in their building or they live in their zip code.
And so I think that people really it seems that they really want Community but they also want to be able to retreat from that when they're you know when they want to be on their own.
And I think that's a really important point so we are very thoughtful about how we group geographically cluster or units.
And we do it around community centers like YMCAs or JCC's our local neighborhood community centers and that really creates this sort of Hub and spoke.
Senior Living experience but you know doing it outside the walls.
[12:08] I think it's fantastic when I worked in one of the retirement homes I used to work at there were new apartments that came up and a lot of our independence seniors flocked out to the.
But then when they got there what they didn't realize the apartment didn't realize there'd be so many seniors coming,
and then what the seniors didn't realize is there was no socialness setup and even as much as something simple like a coffee break or something like that although
you know ideally for social purposes we'd want something more than a coffee break but just starting a little bit it's basically to have people gather right and that's,
something that those apartments around that specific retirement home actually adjusted to and started programming for the seniors because they saw the need.
So I'll give you those contacts when you get to Canada please that would be fantastic.
I'm just before the break can you tell me a little bit about the people that might be interested specifically actually I you know I hear Freddie in my ear it's one minute so let's
instead of getting into that now let's go out to a break Jake,
so what we'll do when we get back is Jake and I are going to continue the conversation and learn about a little bit more about people that might be attracted to learning or learning living in these apartment Style
homes as well as a little bit more about our Healthcare System currently and what that might look like for upside home in jail
so we'll talk to you in a little bit you're watching Artful aging with Amy on will break TV.
[13:38] Are you a native retirement living but unsure where to begin a retirement home advisors .c a we have brought Senior Living advisors together from all over Canada to help families navigate the senior living industry.
For more information book a call with one of our advisors today.
[13:55] Welcome back I've been talking with Jake all about apartment living for independent seniors as many of you know I work permit homes mainly where we assist our tea and toast clients but mostly for the reason that there's not a lot of options we talked about before the break have some of the apartments
are now kind of seeing this trend especially as you know the next 20 years of trend you know seniors are going to be a hot spot for
for everything actually not just in the city of living industry so they started to see a little bit of a trend but again there's not a lot of stuff and definitely really nothing that I've heard of besides up,
at home for what we're speaking of today so,
I definitely see some of the issues with our current system especially moving into a time again like nothing else that we've ever seen so how do we support these individuals,
seniors going forward.
[14:47] Jake with the world changing and a lot of unknowns with our Healthcare System I know that you're in the state's I'm in Canada and there's a lot of stuff going on not to mention just covid because that's where we you know that's where we're at right now at the show but our Health Care system is changing.
Why do you feel like now is the best time to launch a website home.
[15:05] It's a great question and I think that it's hard to know exactly how all the changes that have been accelerated as a result of covid or not will play out over the next 10 15 20 years or Beyond.
But what we're feeling in the States and what you've probably been feeling in Canada for a long time or longer than us is this movement towards value-based care versus fee-for-service.
And we're seeing it more acutely.
Sort of everywhere and realizing that social determinants are really critical in maintaining and improving Health outcomes for older adults and for everybody.
Housing has is one of the most studied social determinants of health and I think that payers are starting to realize that the federal government starting to realize that.
And if we're able to control a whole host of services also rounding of persons living environment.
We can we really believe that we can improve outcomes meaningfully and Senior Living should be able to do the same thing.
So you know I think that there's going to be this big movement on prevention and on value creation for for older adults.
And it's simple interventions I mean Papa created a completely brand new class of caregiver.
And the you know the health plans realize that if you can.
Make someone a little bit less lonely and you can provide them some basic assistance with things like changing the television remote battery or driving them to the grocery store a couple times a week.
[16:34] You can actually reduce fall risk and you can reduce hospital visits and you can reduce all of these different things and ink you know improve quality of life for people and so I think that the system is just starting to wrap its head around.
You know payment and reimbursement infrastructure and.
How we do all of these things but I think I'd say the overall longer-term trend is value-based versus what we've been doing here in the states at least for a long time and fee-for-service much more reactive.
[16:59] Absolutely yeah I'm with just speaking briefly of covid what you know what we saw happening myself and my team is that you know a lot of people stopped and didn't move right and so they waited it out these independent folks,
waited it out but then they got isolated then they were in homes with stairs and things like that and so then they had to move and so when everything lightened up.
This past fall which fall in the seniors living industry generally is busier kind of follows real estate Trends a lot of people.
Decided to make a move but so then we had.
Do normal fall people like the rate the people that would have moved we have the backlog of the covid people who would have moved and now we have the new bubble of seniors
just because there's more seniors in the industry and so
you know our homes here have started to get fill up more and more and more past you know getting waiting list and stuff which hadn't really happened before so
you know it's nice to be able to almost reuse apartment-style living and like you said intergenerational living because the buildings are already there
they can be you know formed up so maybe you could tell us a little bit more about that you know if you're looking at bringing on different apartments for our seniors.
What kinds of things do you do in those apartments to make them safe how do you adjust them.
[18:20] It's a great question and you're right I we're going to need to have capacity for the for the conditions in the market covid accelerated a lot of these things and we're seeing occupancy rates go up in traditional Senior Living all day and all the time now.
Which is great for the industry and.
You know we really want to make sure that apartments are conducive for the person from a safety standpoint so what we do though is we do it just in time so
we have a very wide range of people that live with us from an Acuity standpoint from an age standpoint we have residents as young as 60 and Residences old has 87 or 88
and so we don't want to over optimize these units and what we do is we do a very thorough intake when a person comes to us for the first time we really understand we do a home safety assessment for safety assessment to understand,
what the risks that that's person poses are.
Are what the risks to them are and then we just in time retrofit the apartment based on their individual and specific needs and then of course over time as a person ages and as a person might.
A big break a hip or whatever it might happen over the course of an aging Journey we are there at every moment in order to continually optimize that unit so if today a person doesn't need shower grab bars but tomorrow because they had a.
Fall and they are just coming out of rehab program.
For physical therapy now they need shower grab bars and we can be there just in time actually just before I met they they really need it so everything that we do is just in time and it's optimized for the for that specific individual.
[19:49] I think that's terrific because I like a lot of our independent seniors that I talked with don't like you said they don't feel old they don't want they have a younger mindset.
They don't want to be moving into somewhere.
That has a lot of those safety features are already because those some of those things make people feel older right like a lot of a lot of ground bars and things like that although their safety and all understand what the purpose is of them.
Many people actually choose not to move because they don't want to be set up in that way
before they need to do that so I think that that is super advantageous because like I said just in time just as they need it you guys are there to kind of to keep the ball rolling for them to keep them safe and just to support them in their own environment.
As they go
yeah you know I think there's always been a stigma with getting older and it's and the products that we built for older adults over the forever have been sort of associated with that stigma and so people are reluctant and they're hesitant.
And you know the same goes for the physical building and the physical apartment it needs to be welcoming and comforting and it means the feel like.
This is it supports me but I'm not in an institutionalized type of setting I don't even people don't want to live in a hospital setting.
[21:06] Well a lot of the products to be honest or ugly as well right they're just their institutional they're kind of ugly
people just don't want them I mean we're thrilled one of the companies here got grab bars,
like toilet toilet whole toilet paper holders that were grab bars to or towel racks it did the same because they didn't look as bad they didn't have this weird look to them they find it.
Yeah they do yeah well Jake this has been super informative for more information on Jake and upside home head over to Artful aging with a b.com Jake thank you so much for joining me today.
[21:38] Really appreciate it it's been a pleasure.
I said we'll see you soon after the break we're going to speak with another friend of mine Elizabeth you definitely want to stay tuned you're watching Artful aging with Amy on Bold Brave TV see you in a few.
[21:53] Hurtful aging with Amy is currently looking for gas and show ideas for our next season drop us a line at hello at Artful aging with a me.com and let us know what you would like to learn about in our upcoming season.
[22:06] Welcome back to Artful aging with Amy where I bold Brave TV.
I first met our next guest a few years ago and I was over the moon excited to meet her and know about her new business.
Elizabeth audit Bordeaux is CEO and co-founder of well be well be is the fastest-growing resident experience platform in senior living communities.
Now why is this important or Innovative you might ask so when I started my career in Senior Living about 20 years ago.
I began in Recreation and back then communities tract Recreation stats it's not only to hold up their accreditations
but as well to make sure that the resins well-being is taken care of properly and to catch any problems and health issues that might result from things that might have come on however,
in that day and time
and really up till now because our system is just starting to get organized and Recreation I feel the recreation managers and myself literally had binders and papers and unorganized
amounts of stuff on our desk just to make this stuff happen.
[23:14] It was super daunting task often left to the end because nobody wants to go through all these binders and paperwork's to check off of someone he was at an event,
and we weren't really doing a lot with this information at that point it was more so to hold the accreditations and things like that so well be
fixes all of this and most importantly sent each Community up to not only be successful in their paperwork game but also more successful and learning there
Behavior learning what what better suits them,
I'm to be able to have better conversations even and more engagement and happier residents so welcome Elizabeth thanks so much for joining me today.
[23:52] Jaime thank you so much for welcoming me on your show I'm super excited to be here.
[23:57] I'm so happy to have you on now I know that I've not done well be Justice by my brief explanation so could you please tell us a little bit more about well be and what the main issues you are that you are addressing.
[24:09] I actually think you did a very good job so don't be silly because I'm sorry excited about it exactly I love how you've always been excited about well being
and I'm very excited to be here as well so thank you again so pretty much what well be does is like you said right now Recreation staff will just have everything and binders on paper so a new Resident will move in,
they'll get to know the resident.
Answer all the questionnaire to fill out all the questions on paper put it on their desk and never look back at it and it gets very hard to remember what each resident like don't like and theirs,
obviously sadly a pretty high
staff turnover so if 11sec remembers the residents and she leaves or he leaves then this data is gone.
[24:54] So for us this was a big issue and we needed to fix that on top of them being overwhelmed and overworked because they're just running everywhere so we're like Kate,
we're in at the time we were in 2018 week there's got to be a better solution we can support them and help them digitize everything so that we can,
how kind of this A system that can help them through their daily tasks.
So now it will be whenever new resident moves in they will answer all the questions they were answering on a piece of paper but now on Welby,
and well be will then aggregate all this data and start making recommendation to the staff as to how they can improve the engagement how they can make sure to engage every residence the way that they want to,
so when the era of Netflix Amazon and Google which is just personalizing everything for you we are personalizing the experience of the residents in those communities by providing the staff with the right data.
[25:45] I think it's fantastic and it's it's so helpful because you're right most a lot of the communities have
one Recreation manager very few I've seen and it could be changing now because of the changing needs of the seniors but most often it that's the only person right and so in long-term care we had
a couple of Rec assistance and things like that but in retirement living and I know you do both right so
in retirement living there's often a recreation manager and sometimes there's not any other people and so that person is not only responsible.
[26:20] Organizing running planning all those events but they also have to keep up their accreditation and make sure that their abiding by stuff they have to learn about their residents.
And just speaking from my own experience it's a lot of a lot of work a lot of things to do especially,
in the bigger homes one of my first homes we had I think about 150 units right and so that's 150 to 180 residents and that's a lot of stuff to know so how did you come up with this idea of well being.
[26:50] So pretty much it's.
By then my grandpa started being sick and he needed a bit more supervision so we thought why not put him into a retirement community thinking he would have the help and then also at the same time join a community so he would,
engage with them and hopefully is held would at least stay the same or get better but then sadly it did the opposite of that is
is held like really got affected when we put them into that community and then he passed away a few months later and for me it was really that life-changing
moment where I was like okay what happened here like we were promised this amazing Community he's going to go out talk with everybody join activities were going to engage in we know him,
we know what he likes what he doesn't like but in fact he ended up just being in his room and I.
[27:36] At the time I was a bit frustrated to be honest because I was like what happened and then when I actually went into a community so we ended up sleeping at some communities to really understand what was going on.
And I realize like how.
How can I human being remember 150 people plus what they like what they don't like have they gotten out of their roof might they not what have they been doing it just gets out of hand and on top of that they got to run everywhere like you said.
There are some regulations so they need to do some recording and we've noticed they are spending about 30 hours a month so almost a full week.
In their office having to do some administrative tasks so this is impossible to do like they're just overwhelmed and
and these people are in the domain because they want to help your loved one but they just can't because they don't have the time in the right resources so at that point I was like okay
there's got to be a better solution and that's when we created well be and now we are saving them about 25 hours of administrative time a month so that's almost a full week back,
into their schedule that they can now go and interact with the resident make sure that they're having a great time and on top of that they now have the data.
To know what this residents like I've they haven't been seen and how long are they not been seen for so that they know who to engage with and who not an especially during covid-19.
This came in super handy because.
[28:58] Obviously you want to know like if any staff member needs to come in to try to support the recreation staff they just go on to well be and they know everything about Claire and how to engage with her and make sure that she's going to be having a great time,
not be socially isolated like we've seen three covid I think that's fantastic because there's a lot of times in retirement as a part of the management team,
where if the wreck persons off the management has to step in or other staff have to step in,
ensure if it's a day or so you know not being 100% maybe won't make that much of a difference but if it's an elongated period,
you know it does make a big difference.
And and trued also is that the right people are running around and a lot of times out of building and part of this.
They doing things for the residents and with the residents and in their office reporting it's really really.
Difficult for everybody so what we're going to do we'll take a break and after the break we're going to continue this conversation you're watching Artful aging with Amy we're on Bold Brave TV we'll see you in.
[30:03] Are you and your family considering Senior Living options but you're not quite sure where to start.
In my best-selling book breadcrumbs piecing together the retirement living industry you will find tips and strategies for navigating the entire Journey.
Whether you're needing help with understanding the basics or strategies to help a loved one with dementia it's all inside.
Head over to tea and toast dot c a /e book to pick up your copy today welcome back
I've been speaking with Elizabeth of Welby and now I know that well be can do a whole host of things where we just started touching on it now
one of my personal favorites is the personalized plans in calendars because let me tell you as a former record person,
I When developing the calendars they all look different from each home regardless of which brand of home you're under,
it's Troublesome because it's like what software are you using,
you know how many things can go into one of the calendar boxes it's a nightmare more than the general public would understand I think.
[31:06] Could you please a little elaborate a little bit Elizabeth to our listeners about what the platform offers both to Residents and their families.
[31:16] Yes certainly is so pretty much once we've gathered all the data about this resident Welbi knows about this resonance so we can now make recommendations as to what third personalized calendar would look like so let's take Claire who mention when she moved in,
five years ago which right now if they don't have well be they wouldn't even remember that she mentioned that but now it will be remembered that she loves
Aqua fit she loves bowling and she has a big love for cats as an example so what well B is going to do is that each month whenever the recreation staff will organize the community calendar,
it's going to make some suggestions as to which type of activities they should import into their calendar so that they can maximize engagement within their community,
because it's not true that everybody plays Bingo and loves mango all throughout the country it's different based on where you live where you're at the region you're in and your background story so.
Well we will make a recommendation in terms of what to put on that big Master calendar.
[32:17] And then after that it will automatically generate a personalized calendar for Claire based on what she's mentioned that she's like,
so as an example in this situation she would see when aquafit is happening when there will be a visit like
some cats into the community
and when bowling will be happening so Claire now has her own calendar and this is amazing for on the retirement home side because we know on retirement there can be
300 activities going on all throughout the month so it gets very complicated but it's also great on the memory care side of things where someone might not remember,
when their activity or happening and it's important to still engage them so right now what they would do without well B is actually print the calendar start highlighting
with a highlighter every single calendar for each residential 300 residents one by one now it will be one click they get to print it share it with the residents and they're happy about it,
so that's been a very big impact and then on terms of the impact for the families
then they get to see which event their loved one would be would like to attend so that that way if they want to come with them obviously with the covid measures it's been a bit harder but they get to see what their loved ones are doing
which has been pretty popular lately especially when you can't see your loved one because at the measures that have been put in place.
[33:35] For sure I'm actually getting flashbacks of highlighting so for sure what you're saying that I was saying to Elizabeth over the break I love that they went into the communities and spend some time there so they actually understand what the flow and the community is and I think,
you know well be has such a interesting Innovative product that any retirement home or long-term care home that brings it on,
I believe that you know the people that are moving they're going to have a heightened
sense of involvement a heightened sense of you know making sure that things are more tailored to them a little bit happier about it and hopefully what happened with Elizabeth family doesn't
continue to happen as more and more people get well be in their systems but,
as I mentioned previously I've been a recreation director and in hindsight there wasn't a lot of help I was thinking about this for the show today there just wasn't a lot of help and to be honest.
[34:30] A lot of the other managers did didn't take the recreation manager as seriously
and I think it's you know generally still happens today right because they don't they see you know recreational that's not as serious as feeding people or
invoicing and things like that but
it is it's a very serious job people like you said Elizabeth go into this job because they love what they do they want to impact people in a positive light
with their Rec backgrounds or their passions so why have you chosen to build a platform in the recreation space in the first place I know you know you've got your own personal story but like I said Recreation managers are kind of those those folks that are just,
not seen as much as some of the other managers.
[35:15] So definitely the unsung heroes to be honest when you take the time to live into a community you will notice how crucial they are to the community.
And for me I really see this as okay you've moved into a community because you were promised that you were going to have an amazing experience that they were going to be there for you and make sure that there's otherwise you can just stay home right especially on the retirement home side,
and.
The recreation team I see them as the experienced team like they're making sure that once you move in there is the extension arm of the family they're making sure you're having a great time and that you are well taken care of.
And there are studies out there that actually shows that if you're not engaged and you're not participating in your socially isolated into your room it increases your chances of suffering of Dementia by 64 percent and it's as bad as smoking 15 cigarettes a day.
So there has to be something done in order to make sure that our seniors are not socially isolated and the team that is responsible for that,
is completely overwhelmed and don't have the right resources and that's why it well be has been very important for me to get out there and tell people about how important Recreation is like you said.
[36:24] There are most often
I thought about like the last they will be last into the kind of the the line of like priorities which is extremely sad because they should be first there are the first ones that were engaged with the resident they were there one that will make sure they're having a great time
and are enjoying their time within the community and the health impact is based on them being engaged,
and that's how you can maintain them a good and healthy position to that they can stay within your community as long as possible.
[36:54] And you know all of that of course and then not to mention on the retirement home side of the operator,
you know a lot of the retirement homes and as Jake and I were talking about there's more and more seniors coming in which means there's more and more independent seniors because people are living longer,
and a lot of residences and businesses want to attract,
the younger independent senior but then they don't fulfill the other side of the recreation programs the good food program like you know things like that so you know when you're wanting to attract a certain clientele as a retirement home,
you have to give them what they're looking for and so those independent seniors in my own experience.
Move to retirement homes either because they're isolated because they're nutrition,
you know not going well or they having trouble doing that or they need some social that's usually why independent people make a move to retirement and so you have to make sure that you can back it up when people move if that's the clientele that you want,
the percent 50% are the people that say that they moved in for the community,
so it's not about food it's not about everything else it's too easy for communities to be the same they're all the same now location food they're all the same now it's all about the experience that you're providing through your resonance and that's why well bees here.
[38:09] Yeah I used to like I used to say cruise ship on land is what we're trying to get to so we're at the time already Elizabeth thank you so much for joining me today for more information on well be and Elizabeth head over to Artful aging with a me.com
again thanks Elizabeth.
[38:25] Thank you so much have a great day thanks we'll see you after the break and I'm going to go over my top tips for supporting independent senior.
[38:34] Are you watching us on YouTube but would rather listen to us in the car or on a walk no problem artfully aging with Amy is also available as a podcast.
Head over to Artful aging with a me.com for the links.
[38:50] Welcome back I hope you've enjoyed today's information as much as I have but like I said I really love.
When new folks come into the Senior Housing Industry sometimes it can be a bit stuffy.
With old ways and with a lot of new seniors entering the market things need to change and we need to shake it up a bit so I'm super grateful for Jake and Elizabeth joining me today.
I'd like to give you some top tips on ways to keep seniors who are independent more engaged a lot of seniors that are independent
tend to kind of do their own thing so you know their family members don't really know you know what they're up to you sometimes and if they get isolated they want to make sure to take care of it so how do you keep people engaged or something.
[39:32] So is to support their social.
So sometimes that means offering or helping to arrange transportation so sometimes people stop doing things socially because they can't get out and so
organizing transportation for them or or getting them places would help quite a lot in another part of the social life is a lot of families to
that there are senior loved ones should slow down or stop an activity because they're getting older but that's generally not you know
not the best approach because a lot of these independent seniors would like to keep doing their stuff but maybe they just need a little bit of help like I said and transportation or something so let's try not to discourage people from being active and engaging.
[40:16] Tip 2 is check in and pay attention the sooner you catch something the better off you can change it so make sure that if you have an independent senior or any senior in your life you're checking in
you're you're touching base with them often and paying attention to things that may change because
if you can catch it early enough there's often a lot of things that you can readjust so that
it doesn't go down the sleeps a steep slope so you know for instance if they're for some reason tripping over throw rugs all of a sudden or what not even though it's not Recreation base
getting those out of there right away will prevent a fall off of throw rugs down the way so think about that just try to pay attention to what's going to generally going on.
[41:01] Tip 3 would be for the seniors to keep engaging in exercise it's a good rule of thumb for all of us I feel but keep moving it doesn't always have to be standing up there's definitely a lot of exercises that are chair exercises even,
chair yoga there's chair drumming we talked about on episode 3 as well so had back there and learn about that there's lots of different things to do,
tip for really are things like audio books you know teach them I guess audio books and texts so
help to teach your seniors that in your lives how to use these different things in the tech Universe because things like video calling and Facebook.
Have all become even more important to stay connected so make sure that they know how to use it and if they're interested in and if one thing doesn't work try something else.
And then lastly tip 5 would be you know maybe look into some Senior Living options whether it's in the apartment style like Jake was talking about or in retirement like we were talking about just a minute ago often that done.
[42:04] A lot of their peer Network in a lot of people have similar experiences and that is one of the reasons that people tend to move that way.
So that's it for today on next week's show we're going to be talking to Lisa Garland all about foot care as we age
for more information on today's guest please head over to our full aging with a me.com and always feel free please like and share our episode so that more people can find them,
thanks so much for joining us today I hope you have a wonderful one.
[42:34] You've been listening to Artful aging with host Amy Friesen
Many folks just like you feel they're alone in their journey and helping a loved one or.
So tune in each week and let a me show you that help is around the corner and it's just one conversation way here on Artful Aging with Amy
