Messages that Matter | Text-Em-All Blog

How to Create a Great Senior Living Patient Experience

Written by Kaitlyn Orred | Aug 2, 2021

Usually, when someone moves into a senior living facility, they will spend the rest of their life there. This very notion means we have to do everything in our power to ensure an outstanding senior living patient experience. This is critical for the patient’s quality of life and their family’s peace of mind. But, how can you go about achieving this? Read on to discover some great tips and suggestions.

Use a mass texting service at your senior living facility

There is only one place to begin, and this is with making the most of a convenient mass texting service at your care facility. After all, communication lies at the core of every care establishment. Not only does this relate to your contact with the patient, but also with their family. You will be able to ensure that any essential updates are communicated quickly and effectively.

Some of the different ways that you can use a mass texting service at your senior living facility are as follows: mandatory employee training reminders, certification update reminders, open shift alerts, health screening reminders, bed management, and monitoring notifications, sending photos of weekly or daily food menus, notify tenants about upcoming inspections, new resident welcome messages, special announcements for birthdays and such like, and community event notifications.

As you can see, there are many different ways that mass texting can help you to run your care facility more openly and efficiently. You can also use this as an excellent opportunity to gain feedback from your residents. You can discover whether there are any areas that you need to improve on so that you can continue to enhance the living experience all patients enjoy.

Understand where to improve with customer surveys

As touched upon briefly in the former section, surveys can be a helpful tool for improving the patient experience at your senior living facility. This is something that you will be able to implement via the mass texting service you use. However, let’s dive a bit deeper into how surveys can help you improve the patient living experience. 

Surveys provide you with an excellent opportunity to find opportunities for improvement and discover areas of your business that are successful. For this to be the case, though, you need to construct your surveys with a lot of care. Make sure that they are brief and straightforward. Moreover, before you put the survey together, establish the types of metrics you want the survey to deliver. Many companies will use the same survey again and again so that they can identify and track trends and efficiently spot any issues. 

Do not undervalue the power that surveys can have when optimizing the experience in your senior care home. Collecting data, assessing it, and acting upon it goes hand in hand with showing patients and their family members that you care about them and that you are committed to going the extra mile to ensure residents are happy. 

Help patients stay connected with friends, family, and their community

Seniors who feel lonely and isolated are at greater risk of dementia and often live shorter lives. Loneliness is something a lot of the older generation struggle with, so you need to make sure that you look for different ways to avoid such feelings. One of the best ways of doing so is by helping older adults stay connected and encouraging them to be part of the community.

There are several different ways you can go about this, including arranging for friends and family members to visit, eat with them, or take them out regularly. It would be best if you also looked to get your patients involved in a hobby.

Another good idea is to speak with a charity organization, community group, or church in the local area to discover whether there are any valuable ways that the seniors at your care home will be able to volunteer and contribute to the cause.

Little things like this can make a massive difference when it comes to patient quality of life!

Track reviews online and leverage data

The final piece of advice that we have for you to enhance the senior living patient experience your establishment offers is to spend some time reading reviews online.

Today, it is incredibly easy to read feedback and reviews that have been left by people who have had dealings with your care establishment before. Not only can you look on independent review platforms, but you can also search your organization’s name on social media to see what people have been saying. See Instagram comments.

Although it can be frustrating and upsetting when you read negative comments about your care facility, this is an excellent opportunity for you to understand better what your patients want and to deliver a much-improved experience for them.

If there are any complaints or negative reviews, make an effort to contact the person so that the issue can be addressed and resolved.

Final words on creating a great senior living patient experience

So there you have it: some of the different ways that you can create a great senior living patient experience. If you would like to find out more about implementing a mass texting service at your care facility, Text-Em-All can assist. Sign up to start your free trial today!