This week, we’re discussing how Person Centred Software’s Clinical Care System has helped a community-based not-for-profit and registered charity, Adina Care, improve its caregiving processes:
Adina Care is a community-based not-for-profit and registered charity operating residential care and retirement village services in the regional town of Cootamundra, New South Wales.
Adina Care was established in 1986 (Cootamundra Nursing Home). Over the years, Adina Care has undertaken several different projects to increase the size of the facility and the services offered.
Sue McGlynn, Deputy Director of Nursing at Adina Care, said: “As a community-owned not-for-profit organisation, we devote all our resources to the care of our residents across medium care, high care, respite care, palliative care and dementia care, within a 62-bed residential care facility. Additionally, we have 25 independent self-care living units.”
Discussing Person Centred Software, Sue said: “Before introducing Person Centred Software, Adina Care was pretty much completely paper-based.
Person Centred Software was recommended to us and then after some research, we saw the potential to improve the quality of care for our residents and decided to make the shift – luckily, we did this before COVID-19.
Our staff are who we credit for allowing Person Centred Software to transform our work practices in the home – they embraced the software and made the transition as seamless as possible.”
Adina Care introduced Person Centred Software in August 2019. Although the caregivers found it useful before, they valued it even more so during the pandemic.
Acknowledging the detrimental impact of COVID-19, Sue said: “Unfortunately, the pandemic has affected older people disproportionately, especially those in aged care facilities. It has been difficult for both our residents and their families, as the restrictions that were in place to protect our residents meant most people were not able to visit their loved ones in the home.
“During the times where no visitors were allowed, we facilitated ‘window visits’ where residents could speak to their loved one behind a window using a baby monitor, and we also facilitated Skype calls. Even during such a stressful and anxious time for all, our staff allowed this to happen and were extremely flexible and helpful when it came to navigating these new visit methods for our visitors.”
But the adaptation did not stop there; Adina Care additionally made great use of the Clinical Care System throughout this trying time.
Sue continued: “Like others, we have had to keep up with the ongoing changes the pandemic brought whilst simultaneously maintaining the best level of person-centred care possible.
“We can rely on Person Centred Software for less duplication and errors in documentation reports, facilitation of efficient information documentation and sharing, and better support for any staff shortages through the automation of tasks – complete resident data is available on a device and
without delays in updates.”
The Clinical Care System is icon-driven which saves time, whilst additionally comprising pre-filled sentences that staff can then adapt. This speeds up the note-taking process, enabling carers to spend more time providing direct care to residents.
Sue said: “Essentially, less paperwork means our staff have more time to spend directly on care, while capturing all the different moments of care in real-time and adhering to legislation and health directives. In addition, all our documentation has increased; it is all in one place and easy to access.
“We use Person Centred Software on our PC desktops, handheld devices and, most recently, staff have begun using it on their personal devices, which means all staff members can safely and securely access the software at any time and anywhere. Now, there is more time to spend on care with less admin, whilst simultaneously meeting legislative reporting requirements.
“Person Centred Software prompts us to work more efficiently as we can see all our residents in the facility, and who is on respite and who is not at any given time. We can see the care needs of residents that still need to be met and staff can quickly see what they need to be doing at any time of the day.”
Person Centred Software has enabled Adina Care to access much better-quality information. With more data being recorded, caregivers can identify patterns to minimise falls, monitor wound management and facilitate best hygiene practices.
Sue said: “The main benefit we’ve found is that our staff can spend more time on direct care with the residents. We have noticed that we are recording more – it’s now so easy to see residents’ observations, blood pressures, weight loss, matrix of falls, and so on.
“We can easily print off reports and see who has infections; the information we have access to is of much better quality. This helps us to reduce the risk of anything being forgotten and the different types of reports available allow us to target specific areas of care that need attention.
“We can additionally see who has and hasn’t got advanced care plans. When it comes to falls, we can look at them for the month – see who has had falls, what’s happened, look at the trends, etc.
The pressure injury reports are very useful as we can see the different stages and can keep track.”
Sue additionally believes that the Clinical Care System has assisted with wound care management, alongside promoting best oral hygiene practices. She continued: “We can attach progressive photo evidence to show progress, which is great for us to be able to easily access, monitor and keep an eye on where we are up to. This is very useful for us to be able to easily record and demonstrate the care we’re providing to the families of residents. In addition, I believe that the Clinical Care System has prompted oral care hygiene best practice for our staff.”
Taking into consideration the many benefits and overall simplicity of the software, Sue has one last piece of advice for aged care homes that are still using paper documentation:
“Get software, like Person Centred Software, that allows you to move to paperless!”
If you’d like to know more about our Clinical Care System, please contact a member of our team.
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