I had the pleasure of discussion with two senior team members at an Aged Care service yesterday about the desire for multiple change. Their change program had been making good progress but then stalled. The halt seemed to relate to the belief that all education had to happen, classroom style before a change could be commenced.
Instead of applying a vast amount of theory, waiting to confirm it was all understood, I suggested looking at the data. Aged Care lack the luxury of time to fully educate while clinical risk is waiting to be addressed, growing by the day.
When looking at data, where is your highest risk? Is it falls? Is it unintentional weight loss? Is it dehydration? Is it behaviors of concern? Is it pressure injuries? With so many options for action, tracking and visibility via live dashboards will help drive meaningful action and support prioritizing highest risk first.
Targeted education on 2 or 3 things at most supports progress being achieved quickly. One suggestion is educate as you go. Keep viewing the related data to determine success of actions. Study, act, review is a shortened version of the well known quality repeating cycle of Plan, do, check, act..
If we work on 50 things that all need improvement simultaneously, the chance of progress and rapid risk mitigation is diluted.
Debbie, the Facility Manager from another site knows this. At Aldwins House, Promisia Group, they are making great use of the Hercules Health LIVE time dashboards to closely monitor clinical data to drive excellence in care.
With around 660 aged care services in New Zealand, every site operates differently but one thing remains true, when they use data to inform care, they reduce risk and improve health outcomes for their residents. Hercules Health dashboards are bespoke to reflect each site and their particular needs.
#agedcare #dha #digitalhealth
