Data-driven care in villages: ignorance is no longer bliss
Retirement villages are no longer just “independent living”. With home care now the default option for ageing in place, operators need visibility of resident wellbeing. Integrating call systems, sensors, and clinical data into one record is now...
Retirement villages are no longer just “independent living”. With home care now the default option for ageing in place, operators need visibility of resident wellbeing. Integrating call systems, sensors, and clinical data into one record is now the minimum standard.
For decades, most retirement village operators have relied on instinct and incident reports to understand resident health. Once someone closed their door, visibility stopped. But as more residents bring home care into their village homes, that model no longer passes the pub test.
Technology can provide a level of oversight, but dashboards don’t change care – data-driven action does.
“The data is there to rely on for care delivery-flagging agitation, guiding medication with GPs, keeping families informed,” said David Waldie, CEO of eevi (pictured top). “The challenge is filtering the noise and proving your response.”
In other words: if you don’t know what’s happening inside your units, you’re not managing risk –you’re avoiding it.
From independence to interconnection
One incident reported during the ‘Bleed them dry until they die’ investigation’ – where a resident was found lying on the floor for days – highlighted the stakes.
While the facts were later contested, what stood out was the operator’s lack of data. No movement detection. No alert trail. No way to prove or disprove care response.
Data, in this context, isn’t about surveillance – it’s about assurance.
“As soon as you bring medication, assessments and alerts into a single view, you stop chasing and start caring,” said Caroline Lee, CEO of Leecare. “You can see risk in context, not isolation, and act before small issues escalate.”
In villages that now provide integrated care, the data tells a story: who’s sleeping poorly, whose call patterns have changed, whose appetite is dropping. Combined with medication records, falls logs, and assessments, that story becomes an early warning system.
“Families are not a nuisance input; they are early warning sensors,” added Caroline. “Give them a structured way to contribute and you’ll catch decline sooner.”
One record, many streams
Most villages already have fragments of data – help-call events, wellness checks, allied health notes, care plans.
The next step is connection. Platforms like Leecare’s Platinum6 link medication, assessments, and operations into a single record. Systems like eevi normalise real-time events from call systems, sensors, and devices.
When that data is linked, care becomes workflow. If a resident’s movement drops, a task is created. If a wound deteriorates, a review triggers automatically. If a family logs concern through a portal, it lands in the same triage queue as staff notes.
David advises operators not to overthink it: “If you’re early on the journey, don’t wait for perfect. Pick three decisions, wire the data, and automate the next step. Momentum beats the grand plan.”
Real-time where it counts
Not every dataset needs instant updates – but some do.
- Safety events: falls, help calls, door openings overnight – alert now, triage now, log now.
- Medication rounds: real-time charting cuts late sign-offs and errors.
- Deterioration flags: repeated sleep interruptions or weight loss should generate tasks, not red dots.
“Speed matters when it’s about safety or meds,” said David. “For governance, the value is completeness and provenance – who did what, when.”
In Home devices for retirement villages to support care and regulatory risk
View David Waldie’s breakfast presentation here.
Turning evidence into action
Data isn’t proof until it changes behaviour. Three steps matter most:
- Alerts create tasks which can then be closed off: Each breach creates a task, someone is assigned, and action is documented. That end-to-end record is your defensible audit trail.
- Use guided assessments over free text: Structured data beats narrative notes. Staff capture what’s needed; the system builds the summary and prompts the next step.
- Recruit families as partners: When relatives log changes in mood or sleep, those reports must feed the same triage queue as staff inputs – visible, tracked, and closed.
The goal isn’t more data. It’s a system that turns insight into accountability.
Staffing by evidence
Data can also play a critical role in staffing. With workforce shortages biting, guesswork rosters no longer cut it. Villages using data heat maps of calls, alerts and care tasks can staff to actual demand.
Operators report fewer agency spikes and better continuity when they roster to acuity by location and hour rather than headcount habit.
Because every response is time-stamped, managers can measure what’s working – and where care hours really go.
Transitions without the cliff
In addition, shared data is essential for care transitions. Most village residents eventually move – temporarily or permanently – into residential aged care. When systems are integrated, the transition doesn’t have to mean a data cliff.
- Early flags: Signs of decline trigger case conferences before crisis.
- Warm handovers: The single record – assessments, medications, wounds, preferences –travels with the person into respite and back.
- Family confidence: Notifications and summaries show someone’s in charge.
Where villages also operate aged care homes, or partner closely with those who do, shared data standards remove duplication and risk.
AI and the foundations beneath it
For now, artificial intelligence is best seen as an assistant, not an oracle – summarising notes, prioritising triage, assembling reports.
“If you don’t trust your inputs, you can’t trust your AI,” said Caroline. “Get the foundations right –then add the clever bits.”
Tech suited to retirement villages considering care and assisted living
View Caroline Lee’s breakfast presentation here.
That foundation is clean, linked, secure data: auditable, encrypted, with role-based access and clear ownership of who closes what.
Governance lives here now
Data isn’t just a clinical asset. It’s a legal one. Boards should expect two-click visibility of key indicators – risk alerts, overdue assessments, medication variance, wound trajectories.
As one director recently told SATURDAY: “If we can’t pull the record in two clicks, we don’t own the risk.”
The new minimum
The era of “we don’t need to know what happens inside the unit” is over. Home care, clinical oversight and safety accountability are now part of village life.
Data is the nervous system that keeps it working – sensing, learning, directing, and documenting the next best action.
Because in the new world of ageing-in-place, ignorance isn’t independence. It’s risk.
