No-one could have failed to notice the huge impact that the current pandemic has had on the UK Care Home sector.
On the negative side, we have seen reports of the sad deaths of both residents and staff as additional costs have piled up with the requirement to avoid staff working across homes, rising prices for PPE and changes to buildings and facilities to keep residents safe.
As always in a crisis, there are opportunities as well as challenges. The health and social care sector has seen a significant boost in the use of technology, with projects that were anticipated to take years to implement being achieved in a matter of weeks. Likewise, GP’s have used videoconferencing to avoid visiting care homes, preserving essential health care whilst protecting their own safety and that of residents.
Nonetheless, the care home sector continues to face significant challenges with reduced occupancy, rising costs and uncertainty about the effects of Brexit on the labour market. Care-home owners and managers will need to start planning now to be prepared for the recovery phase that will follow the current response.
We know that Registered Managers and their teams are focused on maintaining their support to residents and their relatives. They may lack the time to implement the new ways of working that will drive out the efficiency required and deliver the high- quality services that residents and their families value. There is also evidence that use of technology to better manage care contributes to the achievement of good or outstanding ratings from the Care Quality Commission.
We know, too, that staff will more readily adopt technology if it enables them to spend more of their working time providing support to residents. This can contribute to staff satisfaction and a satisfied workforce is more likely to stay. Here at Empiric Partners we have developed a new offer for care homes which combines a deep understanding of their challenges with business and finance expertise, experience of matching technology solutions to needs and accredited support to ensure data protection and GDPR compliance.
Our team is supplier agnostic and will work with you understand your business and user requirements and to identify the best technology solution(s) to meet them.
Those homes that grasp the opportunities will see return on their investment, both in financial performance and in the value derived from better planned, managed and delivered services.
Our team has the necessary skill-set to provide the right advice and to support implementation of digital transformation for your business which will leave care homes better placed to overcome the challenges and take advantage of new opportunities as we move towards recovery from Covid-19.
Ian Cross is Associate Partner responsible for our health care services. To contact Ian see our contact page.