COVID-19 has prompted senior living and care facilities across the country to reevaluate their value proposition and refocus operations. Amenities like fitness centers, housekeeping, dining options, and other lifestyle options remain essential features, but the pandemic has caused providers to make healthcare, safety, and online connectivity top priorities.
Transforming the Way Seniors Live
Recent pandemic-driven changes include the way people enter and exit buildings, more frequent hand washing and sanitizing voice-activated elevators and doors, and more. While the latest vaccine roll-out is welcome news, senior living communities realize future planning must focus on pivoting towards more sustainable goals. Creating the full and comfortable life that the residents expect and deserve now requires quick adoption of new solutions and technologies.
Senior living and care facilities no longer have the luxury of gradually improving or upgrading their tech infrastructure. With the vast majority of seniors now online, technology has proven itself to be the driver of high quality of life. It seems simple enough, but for many facilities lacking the capital investment dollars to make a widescale digital leap, it’s a real challenge.
Senior Communities Benefit from Making the Switch to Medical-Grade Wi-Fi®
The adoption of telehealth has accelerated, and virtual physician appointments have become the norm during the pandemic. New, HIPAA-compliant technologies such as Medical-Grade Wi-Fi® are essential in providing the best physical, mental, and emotional care to residents. Personal satisfaction also increases as full Wi-Fi access allows residents to stay connected with loved ones via platforms like Facetime, Skype, and Zoom.
Pandemic-related benefits include everything from facilitating reliable automatic contact tracing to enabling self-navigating robots that visit patients, automate food service tasks, and perform hands-free temperature checks. Some facilities have even introduced robotic pets to help seniors mitigate loneliness and isolation.
Facilitating Easy Adoption of the Latest Technologies with a No Capital Investment Option
One of the most significant financial outlays in upgrading or installing new technology is hardware. HealthSignals’ Medical-Grade Wi-Fi®as a service enables senior living communities to provide the high-speed internet residents and staff need without the capital investment needed to build the infrastructure, at predictable lower monthly costs. It’s a cost-efficient solution that also covers:
- Design
- Installation
- Management
- Troubleshooting
- Repairs and replacements
- Upgrades
Focus on Quality of Life
COVID-19 has introduced a lot of new challenges for senior living and care facilities. When reassessing their value proposition, senior living providers must now shift their strategic goals. Safety, creative engagement, and access to quality healthcare are all values residents and their families are now keenly interested in having.
Looking ahead, senior communities must pull out all the stops to:
- Keep residents safe.
- Tap into technological resources designed to improve residents’ lives.
- Adopt innovative technologies that not only address the current pandemic but prepare residents and staff for future health crises.
Most if not all the adjustments senior living and care facilities have made due to COVID-19 will stay with us post-crisis. The reliable, fast internet experience provided by HealthSignals’ Medical Grade Wi-Fi® WaaS offers secure, affordable campus-wide coverage that ensures residents have access to all the technological tools they need whenever and wherever they want them. Contact us today to learn more.