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Nursing homes for Baby Boomers envisioned
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What will the nursing home of the future look like to care for the large population of Baby Boomers?
Most Baby Boomers probably aren't thinking about a life in a nursing home or even preparing for a life in which they can't care for themselves.
But one think tank -- the Business Innovation Factory -- is trying to peer into the future of elder care with its Nursing Home of the Future Initiative.
"With the current elder care system in peril and millions of baby boomers on their way to old age, the pressure is on to fundamentally redesign our country’s approach to elder care," BIF says in its introductory page on the project.
Its mission, it says, is to "build a platform for experimentation where partners can design and test new ideas for improving elder care in a working nursing home/assisted living facility."
The project has two parts:
Phase I was spending hundreds of hours during the summer in the Tockwotton Home, a 30-bed assisted living center and 42-bed skilled nursing facility in Providence, R.I., interviewing staff, patients and family and cataloging their information and observations.
Phase II, set to begin in January 2009, involves "experimentation with new products, services and systems for improving the elder experience."
Some of the Phase I observations -- the daily routine, the triad of interaction among patients, caregivers and family, and much more -- can be seen here.
After you look at some of the documentation, BIF invites feedback. It doesn't want to be the only thinkers on this matter, after all.
