Senior Care Academy - A Helperly Podcast
Senior Care Academy is the podcast for caregivers, senior care providers, and families with aging loved ones. Hosted by experienced professionals, we explore essential topics like elder care planning, dementia support, financial advice, and emotional wellness for caregivers.
Each episode offers expert insights, practical tips, and resources to help you navigate senior care with confidence. Whether you're a healthcare provider, a family member supporting aging parents, or a senior adult seeking guidance, this podcast delivers actionable advice tailored to your needs.
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Senior Care Academy - A Helperly Podcast
Senior Care Last 2024: The Biggest Trends Changing the Industry
What if the future of senior care lies in the seamless integration of technology and human compassion? Get ready to explore this fascinating intersection in our latest episode of the Senior Care Academy podcast. Aaron and I delve into the trends shaping senior care in 2024, as the industry recalibrates after the COVID-19 disruptions. We uncover the significant demand for senior care services despite the stagnant growth in caregiver numbers. Join us as we highlight insights from the Utah Symposium on Aging Care, which inspire fresh approaches to meet these challenges and underscore the government’s role in supporting aging in place through initiatives like the Older Americans Act.
The promise of technology holds immense potential for aging populations, and we are thrilled to share how it’s being embraced worldwide. From the heartwarming innovation of Paro, the therapeutic robotic seal, to the capable assistance of RoBear, the nurse robot, we spotlight the ingenious solutions transforming senior care. Japan’s pioneering efforts in addressing demographic challenges offer a model for others, especially the U.S., where home care expenditure is notable. Embracing technology isn't just an option; it's a necessity for enhancing the quality of life for seniors and their caregivers.
Beyond tech, we discuss the enriching concept of community integration, moving away from isolating seniors in facilities towards a vibrant intergenerational living model. This approach not only fosters a sense of purpose but also combats loneliness through diverse activities. We explore practical steps like adopting smart home technologies to support senior independence without the intimidation of full-time care. As we embark on this exciting series of industry insights and updates, we invite you to share your thoughts and suggestions for future topics. Let’s navigate the evolving landscape of senior care together.
On this episode, we touched on...
• The importance of returning to normalcy in senior care post-COVID
• The overwhelming preference for independent living among seniors
• The role of AI and technology in enhancing elder care
• Challenges to technology adoption in the senior demographic
• Global trends in aging populations and their implications
• Strategies to combat senior loneliness through community engagement
• Discussion on future housing solutions for seniors and support systems
Timestamp to help you navigate the podcast:
1:33 – Return to normalcy
2:50 – COVID had a good impact on the senior care industry
6:30 – AI trend for senior care
12:19 – Integrating AI to the industry
14:30 – Internet can help disconnected people to be connected
22:10 – Upskilling the workforce using AI
24:10 – NORC (natural occurring retirement community)
27:13 - Combating senior’s loneliness
27:50 – Find senior’s niche community
28:27 – You dont have to be the innovator, you have to be the integrator
Welcome to Senior Care Academy. Today we're starting, actually, a new segment where we just want to keep you up to date on local trends, government changes, what's happening in the senior care space and with technology, with workforce, with funding to make it. So you don't have to read everything. That was a lot of widths, that was a lot of widths. So, yeah, we're going to start doing this more regularly. Just different updates. We're going to talk about some industry news that we have from 2024 and some things that are projected or already happening in 2025. It's just Aaron and myself. It's going to be a fun little chat.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm a little disappointed. I didn't get like a really fancy intro like everybody else does. But I'm Aaron, I've been on the special episodes we've had behind the scenes producer and yeah, just like Caleb said, we are really excited to and kind of talk about the future, because that's the thing about senior care and really all industries is that it's constantly evolving, constantly changing. Yeah, so I mean, I guess the first question I'll ask you is sum up 2024 in one word for senior care.
Speaker 1:For senior care.
Speaker 2:Or a few words. Yeah, or because how do you encapsulate a?
Speaker 1:feeling. I think it's like maybe return to normalcy. There was a lot of like weird 2020, of course, crazy with COVID, lockdown 2021, there was still a lot, but with seniors being the most affected population, even 2022 and a little bit in 2023, I feel like 2024, we finally got back into being able to help more fully. Obviously, there's a lot of things that we learned through COVID, but care was happening like normal. People were interacting, seniors are interacting, trying to get more back into the space. So, return to return to normalcy, some level of normalcy, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I agree. I mean, I feel like our entire lives. We're going to be referring to COVID.
Speaker 1:You know, when we were 70 years old.
Speaker 2:I was there, but it was such a strange time and I think so many of the statistics as we were doing research for this, like there were so many articles and numbers that came out, like in 2010, 2015,. That, like in the 2020s, all the way to 2030, like demand is going to skyrocket and all of these you know kind of crazy, scary numbers, but it felt like things got better in 2024. Yeah, from the articles I was reading, like a lot of things did kind of level out. Yeah, yes, care demand has increased, but like things have changed so much, like the way we approach care has changed, and that's kind of what we're going to talk about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I do think COVID had a good impact on it forced us to do a lot of research into everything around aging, because it did, uh, disproportionately affect older adults, and so a lot of good educational things that we can now implement in a society that's post-COVID kind of thing.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll share some of the scary numbers that I heard. These are projections, I think, all the way back from 2010. But the 80-plus population is projected to increase by 79% by 2030. But the 80-plus population is projected to increase by 79% by 2030.
Speaker 1:The caregiver demographic ages 45 to 64, will increase by the same period by just 1%.
Speaker 2:So 1% increase compared to a 79% increase. And this is in the US. In 2010, there were seven potential caregivers for every person in a high-risk category. So seven potential. But by 2050, there will only be three potential caregivers for every senior in need of care. So hearing those numbers right off the bat, it's just like alarms go off right.
Speaker 1:It's like, okay, we're not going to be able to do this right.
Speaker 2:It's not sustainable. But I think, kind of as we look forward to the future, we can talk about what's changing and why things have gone better.
Speaker 1:So I guess 2024, what were some of the things that stood out to you? Older Americans they focus on improving support for older adults and getting them more access, because the overwhelming basically they realized surprise, overwhelming majority of seniors or of Americans want to continue living independently in their home and not necessarily moving to an assisted living, which I think I mean. We've talked, had a lot of assisted living guests on the podcast and they're talking about trying to make it more like home, but it's like 95% of seniors want to live independently. So the government basically using the OAA, try to make it more possible with more programs, more services, more funding for companies, similar to Help Release to make it possible so that they can live at home. Similar to help release to make it possible so that they can live at home, which I think was a good step in the right direction, especially with that statistic where 10,000 people are turning 65 every day, like within a decade. We're going to need a lot of, a lot more support helping these people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's really interesting. I didn't know, actually, I hadn't done any of the research on the OAA and but it kind of reflects what we heard. We went to the Utah Symposium on Aging Care a few weeks ago and it was really interesting to hear kind of like local leaders in Utah talking about the problem, talking about the potential solutions, and a lot of the conversation did revolve around like the way we've traditionally viewed senior care and aging care is not going to be the way we approach it in the future. Like we can't obviously by these numbers, we can't have a one-to-one caregiver ratio or whatever. It has to be different and I think aging in place is obviously a big thing and technology is just making that so much more, you know, attainable for everyone.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was the other big thing in 2024. Ai, of course, is just like blown up, so AI. Where AI, of course, is just like blown up, so AI. Even though everybody listening, I love you all, but senior care is a very like slow to adopt technology space, but AI is starting to get increased adoption within, like senior care facilities. We had Ezra Torres on the podcast and how they use AI to detect falls. There's power. Let's see, there was AI wearables, health trackers, power tools like the pain check that identified discomfort for people that can't talk. We're implementing AI to try to track and have higher quality visits in the home. That was a good trend where, because AI is becoming so mass, it's getting adopted by the masses with like chat, gpt and Gemini, which is a very like simple use case for AI. It's starting to get adopted within senior care to try to prevent some of the 2050 doomsday stuff of just not having enough people. How can we use technology? And a lot of little baby steps in the right direction last year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's true. I mean, there's so many initiatives, so many things that are going on across the country. People are trying new things. I think that just reflects humanity in general. This might be an anecdote, but like I don't know if you've ever seen. There was a commercial that Microsoft Excel put out in the nineties of this guy like getting on an elevator and like back, then you know before my time, you know it was like people were.
Speaker 2:there were so many data jobs available. And then Microsoft Excel was like this insane new thing because, like this guy on the elevator could do his entire day's work Like, while everybody else was like stressing he just could put in a formula and all of a sudden all the math is done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and I think that just reflects humanity's progress in general, Like we're constantly trying to put out these fires, so we have to get better, you know. But that pushes us to just become more efficient. Like jobs shift and you know, we end up being able to do so much more with less work. And I think that's the same way that senior care needs to be approached is like one person needs to be able to service five people or whatever, and it doesn't have to be like, oh, it's an 80 hour work week. No, they should be able to do it within the same amount of time. And I think and once we start talking about these technologies, like yeah, there's a lot of really cool things happening to enable that kind of thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think we're a long ways away from like iRobot, where you have a humanoid robot taking care of elderly people, but there are things now and in the next like five years that we can start adopting to make it easier on caregivers to help people Rather, like whether it's automatic reporting or notes taking or like making it so they don't have to have all this extra admin work on the back end, which is kind of what Helperly is making. Yeah, so that way it's less mentally exhausting and they can go from client to client without having all the lead. There's just a lot of interesting things.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean we can start talking about the future because, I feel like we'll still kind of bounce back to 2024. Yeah, and I kind of break it down into a few categories, like there's smart home technology or the technology sector, and there's also AI sector and both of those kind of mix in this predictive analytics for health, and I think that's a big thing and maybe you can touch on. We're even trying at Helperly, because when you think about you know somebody having a fall, which is a huge thing it changes. We have so many clients who their life was you know a certain way, and then they have a fall and it's completely different. They are in bed for months to a year. Sometimes their life never gets back to what it was before the fall.
Speaker 1:We had a client last year that super healthy, and then he fell and then he was very apprehensive of going to like skilled nursing and so then he fell, fell, fell within like two weeks and he passed away within 90 days of his first fall, even though he probably could have lived another 10 years.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that kind of thing, when you calculate, like, the amount it takes to take care of somebody when they fall or when any kind of these illnesses happen, because seniors are just more prone and more vulnerable than they used to be. But that's where the predictive analytics comes in and I think that's where AI is going to be implemented the most to predict health issues. There's companies, yes, like CareLife, and I think if you haven't listened to those episodes, go back and listen with Ezra Torres. It's really interesting to hear how they're implementing like cameras that aren't always turned on.
Speaker 2:I don't even understand it all the way it's like an infrared technology, but like, yeah, seeing when they fall and immediately learning people, so the problem doesn't become, you know, exacerbated, it just, you know, is solved so much quicker.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then you have what we're trying to build, or what we're building at Helperly, which is like trying to predict their care needs based off of how they're interacting in a community. So getting them online and, you know, monitoring, just like how social media algorithms. They kind of monitor your what's the word? Your activity online. Some say they don't, but kind of monitor, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, a little bit of a rattle.
Speaker 1:They monitor like facial expressions, like how do you respond? Like we want to? There's so much within AI that we can start predicting, you know, are they going to have a stroke, are they having early signs? Like my wife had Bell's palsy so half her face went numb and it was luckily she caught it relatively early, but we probably could have caught it earlier. If the cause, your eyebrows start to droop and it was like weird a little bit, but we didn't know anything but plugging AI and everything that it knows into how we're interacting online plus how we're physically looking, um. So that's an exciting thing to really, like you said, predict and take care of the issue before it becomes a problem, um, the issue before it becomes a problem, to prevent the really high, extensive care needs that people that suffer falls or different injuries have.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and I think as I was reading all these things, the same kind of problem kept echoing in my mind that it's like it's so hard to get people to adopt a new technology not just seniors.
Speaker 1:It's hard to get anyone a company a young person to try something new.
Speaker 2:Right, and I think that is the biggest challenge that senior care providers face is they might have these amazing new programs, this new AI program or whatever, but getting the data or getting being able to build the program is tough, because we can give the seniors all these solutions, but helping them kind of integrate it into their lifestyle. That's where the biggest challenge is. But I do think that, as you know, we move forward and we're going to be. You know, treating seniors who are more familiar with technology right. You know our grandfather. It's amazing what he can do on a computer, considering he was born before commercial flight. Or you?
Speaker 1:know like right when commercial flight was coming in.
Speaker 2:So it's crazy to assume he would be like so good at it, Right. But as our population is now more familiar and more familiar with technology, I think it will help these programs and help these you know AI.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree. You have the general like distribution curve where you have the, the 3% or 13% that are early adopters and I think, really nailing it with early adopters and maybe their seniors that are a little younger, like late 60s, early 70s, that are more familiar with technology, and getting them talking about it to make it so in five years or three years the general population, the 60% of the bell curve, are going to be more open to it because the early adopters got all excited about it.
Speaker 1:But, it's really tough to get late adopters, which is, in essence, what 90-year-olds sometimes you still have people that are really tech savvy, that are early adopters at that later age. I think really nailing it with the people that are just before needing senior living, needing senior care, getting them using the resources and the tools to make it normal for when those people actually do move into assisted living, to just have technology in their hand, totally, it's going to make it possible for adoption and I think we're too hard on our seniors you know, just assuming that like, oh, they're not going to be able to figure it out?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like, but yeah, yeah, of course they're not. You know, just assuming that like, oh, they're not going to be able to figure it out, yeah, it's like, but yeah, yeah, of course they're not. You know, they grew up in a totally different time. But having patience with them and like continuing to try to help them adopt these technologies, like progress is being made Right, and I think, so many problems that seniors face we've been talking about the physical, and obviously that is huge, but just talking about senior loneliness, which is such a big problem it's one in four adults, right, or senior adults Um, that's what the internet's for. You know Twitch communities, or you know there's so many parts of the internet where it's all about helping people who are disconnected feel connected and like helping seniors become a part you know a bigger part of internet communities and like building communities for seniors online. I think is a huge part of helping them adopt technology, right? You know, if seniors just all played video games, you?
Speaker 1:know, we just had a mainstream Twitch elder, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And if there's any seniors listening, I'd love to play some Minecraft you know, like heck yeah. And I think things like that it's like we have the technology. It's just about heck, yeah, yeah, and I think things like that it's like we have the technology. It's just about that. Adoption, yeah. But actually I have a list of some really cool companies, if you want. Unless you had something to say, no, I'm good, all right.
Speaker 2:Well, I found this on this link online Eros Care but here are some five random companies that are doing things that are, you know, innovative, and one is Paro, an electric harp seal developed for the memory impaired, reacts to touch chirps, plays games and dances with seniors, so that's a pretty interesting yeah um chihira ako and I don't know how to pronounce this right is designed to resemble a 32 year old woman and encourages the elderly to talk about their problems like.
Speaker 1:So an ai program, an ai therapist but like a robe.
Speaker 2:I don't know if if it's a dismembered head or something just sitting there, which? Might work. I don't know. Pepper can read and respond to human emotions. 1,000 units of this model were put to the market in 2015 for $1,600 and sold out in less than one minute.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:Encore Smart is an assisted walker that can take seniors across even rugged landscapes. And RoBear, a nurse in a shape of a bear I actually really want that can carry a patient weighing up to 176 pounds, wow. And then this one I didn't research this, this might not be very, you know, but hybrid-assisted limbs, so, like you know, giving them an exoskeleton kind of thing that can help them, you know, stabilize and like lift objects.
Speaker 1:That would be huge, especially for people that as you get older and have a hard time walking, or if you have oh, what's it called? It's like dead foot syndrome or something where you lose the nerves in your foot so it just drags.
Speaker 2:That would be huge to have an exoskeleton that can lift or assist you in that Just certain movements that might be difficult, yeah, and another thing that I thought was interesting to kind of talk about and touch on is, like you know, in the US we think everything's about us because it is, but we're not the only ones facing this problem. Like we are not the only country in the world facing an aging population and I looked up what are the countries with the highest aging population. We don't even make it on the top, I think seven or eight.
Speaker 2:Oh wow, so in 2024, it's Japan, then Italy, then Finland, then Puerto Rico.
Speaker 1:I guess that's us.
Speaker 2:Portugal, greece, germany, croatia, yeah, and in 2050, is that per capita or just like yeah, so Japan is? 30% of their population is age 65 and older right now yeah. And the next highest is Italy with 24%. So Japan is actually leading the charge on a lot of these technology companies Because.
Speaker 2:So Japan is actually leading the charge on a lot of these technology companies Because they need to and they don't have the replacement rate Like theirs is even worse, probably, yeah, their birth rates have been falling, and so, even all the way back, I saw an article of back in 2012, 2013, japan started investing billions of dollars into this sector, into technology, to kind of help, so they might be the first ones to have the iRobots, which be awesome, um, but in 2050, the demographic is going to shift again, so it's gonna be Hong Kong, south Korea, japan, italy, spain, taiwan, greece and then Portugal. So, and Hong Kong at 40 percent. So the US isn't even on the on this list.
Speaker 1:Um, 40 that's crazy, like basically one in two people will be over 65. Yeah, yeah and yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I think these numbers help just put it into perspective that we're not the only ones with a problem and we're not the only ones trying to fix the problem Right. There's going to be innovation coming from all across the world in this sector and so much you know, so much growth because it has to be fixed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there has to. It's not just like innovation for innovation's sake, like it has to. It's not just like innovation for innovation's sake, like it has to, or else everybody. That 2050, that puts me, it's 30 years from now, not quite 65, but it puts, like my older brother at 65, which is crazy, right, 30 years from now. And so it's affecting all of us. So we have to figure out how to change it, and so it is so interesting dilemma, but, like you said, another kind of interesting statistic at that. I think it's like $1.1 trillion a year spent on home care, and like $455 billion of that is just in the US. So, even though we're not on the top of the list, we are moving.
Speaker 2:You can move across Japan and still be like a couple hours away from your mom.
Speaker 1:But if you move across the US you're like a couple hour flight.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's true.
Speaker 1:I don't know what it is, but, yeah, it's something that needs to be solved and I think adopting technology and I think the people that help the seniors need to adopt it first Because, like you said, we've all grown up with technology, or at least most of our life has been with technology, so we can fiddle around with these different ai things to try them out, get comfortable with them, so we can then share and help seniors get comfortable and adopt and adopting them so that way they because really I mean within the innovation space, with like venture capital and all those things like as much as people want to solve the problem in 30 years we'll be able to go back and say, look at all this validation that we have and get more funding, because it is super expensive to try to create all these new technologies.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think the initial response when we hear about any of the scary thoughts about the future, right, is like curl up in a little ball and do nothing. But it's nice to know that people aren't doing that. Governments aren't doing that. You know governments aren't doing that. The U S government, you know local governments. People are trying to fix this problem and this problem will be fixed. Right, I don't think society is going to crumble because we can't take care of our seniors.
Speaker 2:I think this is a fixable thing and it's really encouraging to hear about. You know the ideas that are coming along and, I think, just people listening and you know those of us who you know maybe we're just a caregiver, you know we work at a senior care company. How much can we really do? It's exactly what you said Try these new technologies, try thinking of creative solutions, because the way that senior care is going to work in 30 years is not going to look like what it is now you know if it was every senior in an assisted living room, it's not going to work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I was reading some articles about different kinds of housing situations. Right, you know, I mean helperly. We just do at home visits and it's just a few hours a week for some of these seniors, so that's sustainable, right, if one caregiver can visit 10 people in a week and take care of all those people with all this. You know, assistance from AI great, that'll work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, or the preventative stuff from AI, because really like, if it's if they can stay at like a baseline level of physically and mentally to stay living independently um yeah, like I said, you'll need a few hours. It's when they have this crazy injury and then they're forced to go to skilled nursing and assisted living. So, like, help using technology to, like you kind of what's the word? Multiply the impact that an individual can have. And then I think I'm stealing your thunder a little bit because you're going to be talking about the future, but the workforce transition to help train, adopting the technology, use the tools effectively to help upskill individuals to be able to do more with less essence, right yeah totally Like you said.
Speaker 1:We don't want to just overload caregivers to working 80 hours a week and be like that solved it. Yeah, yeah, like, how do we get them to use these tools to make it so they can still work regular 40 hours but have a two times, three times bigger?
Speaker 2:impact? Yeah, no, totally, and I think some of the housing solutions I was reading about which were really interesting are, like you know, tiny homes. They are so popular. Tiny homes could be a solution to senior, you know, care because you don't have space in your house. But you can put up a tiny home for your grandparents or your parents and they still have their independence, but they live close enough that you can help.
Speaker 2:My mom lives right next to her parents, yeah, and she's able to pop over all the time. But integrating these technologies into these new housing situations as well right, having cameras so we can see the status, or wearable bracelets is a big thing, yeah, that measures all of these amazing things so they can instantly know, you know, when something's going to happen. There's a bracelet company that's trying to measure the way that they walk so it can predict the fall itself. Wow, so, based on you, know their stance their balance.
Speaker 1:Ding, ding, ding ding and it's like lean up against the wall really fast for a second.
Speaker 2:Regain. Or smart lights, lights that turn on as they walk, you know, to the bathroom at night to prevent them from slipping or tripping on something that they can't see, you know, on their way to the light switch, that kind of thing. Or you know even just doorbell cameras, which is such a normal thing these days, but a senior who doesn't have to cross the entire house to see that you know they don't want to answer the door, you know. So just you know, in general preventing these kinds of situations and yeah, I think there was even talks of a commune, you know, like multiple seniors living together and only one caregiver to five seniors that live together.
Speaker 1:It's called a. It's actually got a name. It's called a NORC. A NORC naturally occurring retirement community.
Speaker 1:Oh and they're starting to pop up because basically it's I mean, I almost live in one. There's like you have a community, whether it's apartments or condos or just the regular like street neighborhood, where people have just lived there. They all moved in in their 20s, 30s, they stayed there for the last 40 years and now it's naturally occurring retirement community. There's just like 80 are old. Um, but that's an interesting thing like how do we get the 20 that are young? It's not technically a senior living, but just naturally most of the people there are older. So like incentivizing or moving caregiver-esque people into norcs to be able to help the commune type thing you just described.
Speaker 2:Florida, the entire state, it's just one big NORC.
Speaker 1:Basically yeah.
Speaker 2:Lots of naturally occurring, was an architect which was really interesting to talk about, like how housing can change for seniors and how, if you integrate seniors back into normal communities, like, not only does it benefit the senior but it benefits the community. You know, it gives seniors the purpose that they need, where they can pass on knowledge, they can help, you know, teach the next generations, but it also brings them in proximity to people who can help, you know who can trim, you know, their bushes, or you know, can, you know, mow their lawn once a month, or something like that. Yeah, and so it's. I think the way that it's moving is a lot of. We just need to change the idea of all the seniors in one place and one building, you know, separated from communities, but no, reintegrate it back into our normal neighborhoods to help them.
Speaker 2:you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, that's how I grew up. I grew up down the road from grandparents and so, like they had everybody they needed and also on a very populated, child populated street, there was like 80 kids under 18. And so, yeah, they had ample people that could come up and wash the dishes or mow the lawn or like help out, clean the windows, whatever it is Like. They had that natural built-in support and I think that even at 2050, if we get to like a three-to-one ratio, having those three caregivers around the one senior still helps the burden, like just even, like I said, in a community basis, like a non-paid, just like. Oh, I saw that my neighbor, joe, had DoorDash delivered and I know that whatever, like being able to go over, ring the smart doorbell Joe can see, click the unlock button on his phone and they can bring it into the table so he can eat. Yeah, like things like that. That don't take a lot of time, but it spreads the the difficulties or the burdens that come with an aging body.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, Well, I I've kind of run out of topics. I think this has been a really interesting conversation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the last one that I'll throw in there is the movement of combating loneliness. You touched on it, like how do we get seniors online and then combining that with IRL in real life activities to just that's one of the last of the the thing. One of the most positive things that I think came from COVID was realizing the health effects of loneliness and all the effort that's going there.
Speaker 2:So we can talk about that another time, but yeah, maybe we should start treating this like a business meeting. Let's have some action items at the end of this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, minutes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you're a caregiver and you're worried about the people you're caring for. Try to get them online. Try to find some niche community, something to help them stay engaged. That's not the evil Facebook algorithm, you know and if the evil Facebook algorithm, you know, yeah, and if you're a child, try to integrate technologies that we already have you know Smart doorbells.
Speaker 1:Yeah, buy Lowe's and spend 30 bucks on a smart doorbell.
Speaker 2:A Roomba, you know, yeah, an automatic vacuum that makes their life so much better, a chore that is so much harder for them these days. You know, there's already so many technologies that we're just not even taking advantage of.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I think, regardless of your situation, just look into what's available. Not all of us have to innovate, we can just be the customer and like. But you know, being the integrators is a big, big role you don't have to be the innovator.
Speaker 1:You can be the integrator. Get smart lights, get a smart home like. Find online communities, shout out, help really connect. If you want to get your parents on that, but yeah, just start doing these things and helping them break down barriers. A front doorbell is going to be a lot easier than them suffering a fall and then having a conversation about like okay, well, what do we need to do? We need to get you a caregiver or assisted living. So, like, as far as any pushback from parents that maybe feel weird about technology, that's going to be a lot easier sell than let's get a caregiver in here 40 hours a week or let's move you to a skilled nursing.
Speaker 2:Start small. The smart lock has affected our grandparents so much. Oh yeah, anybody can go in and check on them and, like you know, take care, and that's that's. It was a hundred dollars you know it's not that much money and it makes a huge impact. So that's the action item thank you everyone.
Speaker 1:This is yeah, this was fun. We'll be doing more of these. Feel free to comment on wherever you heard this. If there's anything that you want us to follow along and give reports on, we'll start doing these more often. Just kind of industry insights.
Speaker 2:Yay Woo Okay.
Speaker 1:Adios Until next time.