Kentwood staying step ahead of changing long-term care culture
Picton long-term care home preparing to meet needs of future residents
Tuesday July 1, 2008 -- Deron Hamel
Kentwood Park isn’t waiting until it’s too late to start planning for the future. When the baby boomer generation population in long-term care homes begins to expand, the Picton home will be ready with programs to meet the needs of the changing demographic.

Already, the home is considering what supports will need to be in place to placate a generation of residents who will be much more focused on areas such as physical fitness and education than past generations, says Linda Sheppard, the home’s life enrichment co-ordinator.

For example, the home is already starting to look towards more physiotherapy programs to enhance and maintain residents’ mobility because more people are moving into the home ambulatory.

“I am offering (residents) special programs already,” says Sheppard. “I am offering them balance programs and I’m offering them falls prevention programs to keep them mobile so that they can continue to be mobile into their 90s.”

Sheppard adds that the fitness component of life enrichment departments will continue to grow, because the baby boomer population places a heavy emphasis on it.

“We’re starting to see that we’re going to need more physiotherapy assistants to keep our residents active,” says Sheppard. “We’re already starting to do this. We need resources that will keep our residents mobile because they are coming in physically fit.”

Education is another area where Sheppard says the home will need to ready itself.

This means Kentwood Park — as well as long-term care homes throughout the sector — will need to have plans in place to ensure that homes are fully accessible to the Internet for a generation who is very savvy when it comes to information technology (IT), says Sheppard.

“You’re going to see a cultural shift. You’re going to see more educated, more cultured, more sophisticated more savvy people coming into homes and you have to support that,” she says.

Candace Chartier, OMNI Health Care’s chief operating officer, agrees.

“As for programming itself, I think we’re going to see more IT programs because a lot of (baby boomers) are IT literate,” she says.

If you have a story you would like to share about what OMNI is doing to help prepare for the future, please contact the newsroom at 800-294-0051 ext. 23 or e-mail deron(at)axiomnews.ca.

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