APAC Issue 5 2018 - Leecare

10 APAC / Issue 5 2018 , years until 2015. During this time, she often attended meetings and met each month with NEHTA / Commonwealth and IT experts to discuss Health IT needs of the country, the health sector and to ensure secure data provision. Hence these experiences and the ability to obtain advice from these bodies ensured the software deployed to clients continued to be professionally based and secure. Leecare’s Trainer/Consultant Leads, who are involved in the everyday implementation of Clients are Aged Care Assessors with the Quality Agency or Aged Care Managers of a minimum 15 years’ experience at a senior aged care management level. This sets our team apart from many vendors as our team are key sector based professionals wanting to support the sector to grow and achieve quality and technologically advanced status. Over the past four years, Leecare has been the aged care software product used by many nursing homes in Asia via the largest single aged care clinical and operations’ installation in South East Asia with 8,500 beds. Leecare’s client base in New Zealand since 2002, has also ensured Leecare has continued its expert industry liaison role and gerontological expertise that spans countries not just locally. Keeping up to date with all developments, Leecare conducts annual and more often client networking forums to gather information regarding client needs and wishes; constant contact with our Agency Assessor staff and industry experts has ensured the products’ relevance over the years. Still, Leecare issues regular upgrades to clients that include significant additional functionality as requested, and regulatory changes, but because the Platinum5 suite also already supports a resident/client choice and decision-making focus, as well as professional service provision due to the structure used to build the software, it already meets future and increasing client needs and expectations. In this sense, assessments are key and care plans are a reflection of the assessment content with implementation, review/evaluation processes embedded structurally in Platinum 5 functionality, and with the Leecare P5Mobile App, the company’s provider clients can also ensure residents / clients / families / significant others can login and view details as made available (care plans, relevant forms etc.) and staff can access and enter details at the point of care - ensuring information is always available in real time regardless of data entry point. Within the aged care sector, Leecare is noticing significant growth most countries of the world, but the ageing population statistics of Singapore and China in the coming 10-20 years shows a significant need for relevant supportive software. Caroline provides us with her thoughts on the industry at present and tells us what developments she foresees which will have an impact on the sector, and what changes she would possibly like to see. “Funding by governments for the sector is variable across the region with some countries providing no funding whilst others provide support for certain services but not others. This means aged care organisations are necessarily ether self- funded through charities or via residents/clients who must pay for all accommodation and services. Clinical, lifestyle, medication, operations’ and financial management software can sometimes be a last consideration however, its ability to rationalise and condense documentation stressors and requirements cannot be under estimated. “The purpose of developing a web browser solution was specifically to enable data entry at point of care, to enable staff to access information in an easy to read format and to enable picture upload and document upload at the resident home page level, so that picture care plans and relevant care information could be instantly accessible via mobile devices (tablets, mobile phones, iPads etc.) as well as desktops, supporting a paperless system of work. The Leecare two click ‘navigation to anywhere’ scheme enables users to easily locate and enter resident and organisation information. “Plus, the product’s Forms Schema Builder capability ensures an organisation can continue to configure, build and develop the system in line with their staff and client needs - this easy to use feature supports the modification and building of not just clinical forms targeted for residents and clients. However, a staff Forms builder enables competencies and other staff forms to be inserted into the program based on organisation needs, and a facility Forms builder that likewise enables the building and insertion of facility targeted/based forms to suit organisation needs. This further supports organisation autonomy in ensuring the system continuously meets the needs of staff on the ground either in the field or working in a residential care environment, without spending excessive amounts on software change requests. “As such, the factors that impact on the aged care sector are often internal organisation imposed or external funding related. The sector is both poor and rich. It relies on families’ abilities and willingness to support their older family members, whilst supporting young and growing family members. “The professional needs of the sector remain the same as older people regardless of world location or condition still need social and clinical support of a professional, gerontologically focused type – where respect for a person’s wishes, and the need to address varied clinical presentations is paramount. And quality clinical and management expected practices are well documented, embedded into each countries’ quality standards for aged care frameworks whether they are country based or WHO based. The difference is the focus an organisation or a software system chooses.” With customers and clients’ expectations rising throughout the sector, people are expecting to live a better quality of life as they grow older, and this is a sign that Leecare is moving the industry forward in the right direction. As such, Caroline described how the company has been able to adapt to previous developments. “Leecare has always chosen to focus on the resident/client, with an individual client view, and an organisation view from which everything system wide is viewed. This method has kept our focus on the needs of people and the organisation’s we serve. “Excitingly, Leecare has the capacity to expand its offerings and remain financially viable to ensure relevant funded and non-funded developments for the sector. Our focus on constant technology re-investment and ensuring viability through careful fiscal management, including expense and excess management ensures we can afford to stay ahead of the game. “Plus, through strategic software partnerships, where other products can be made available to clients via either embedded or interfaced solutions, Leecare can achieve its aim of further providing technology that has the power to connect people, care and business.” Overall, there is an exciting future ahead for both the aged care sector and Leecare itself, as Caroline predicts in her concluding comments. She talks us through the company’s upcoming plans, and is keen to highlight that the team will continue to be innovative and creative in order to maintain its success. “Looking ahead, our Technology Roadmap includes continued development of our Apps to