technology – Nazareth Home

A History of Groundbreaking Innovation at Nazareth Home

Pictured L to R: George Karakatsanis, Vice President of Sales, Toi Labs; Tracy Fluhr, EHR Clinical Resource Specialist Nurse, Nazareth Home; Kim Hobson, RN, BSN, Director of Clinical Services, Nazareth Home

Nazareth Home has a long history of delivering person-centered care, which honors each individual’s unique needs, preferences, and abilities. A perfect example is our investment in innovation and technology that empowers the elder and helps drive improved health outcomes. Our leadership is very aware of how technology is influencing everyday life for many generations and the aging care space is no different.

A few years ago, we began using iN2L (It’s Never Too Late), a unique technology that creates content-driven engagement and meaningful experiences for seniors. iN2L provides enlightening experiences by allowing Nazareth Home elders to connect with family, virtually “visit” their childhood home and different places around the globe, and play music and games. This technology isn’t just a fun recreational resource – it enriches the lives of seniors by enabling enjoyable, high-quality interactions.

We value everyone within our Nazareth Home community, especially our employees – who are a critical part of our organization. Several years ago, we took a leap with a new financial wellness platform called Payactiv that made our employees’ financial lives easier and directly impacted their livelihood. Revolutionary at the time but simple, Payactiv allows employees to immediately access their earned wages before payday through a tech application (app), transfer funds to their bank, load the funds onto a Payactiv card, or pick up cash at Walmart. This single initiative allows our employees to avoid costly payday loans or pay overdraft fees or late fees. Additionally, it helps reduce financial stress and the need (and discomfort) of asking for a paycheck advance. Ultimately, it also benefits the elders because it serves as an attractive recruiting tool, allowing us to hire exceptional team members who are fully engaged employees with agency over their own financial wellness.

Soon, we will install several more TrueLooⓇ toilet seats at our Highlands Campus following a pilot project earlier this year in our Memory Care neighborhood. Nazareth Home is the first long-term care facility in the state to adopt this early detection product. TrueLoo serves as an automated medical collection device for human biological materials – analyzing them for potential disease, health, or medical indicators – and it does so privately without any burden to the elder. This eliminates the need to observe, interpret, remember, and document stool and urine eliminations – allowing staff to focus on caring for the resident without missing important health data. Providing daily and weekly reports of bowel and bladder patterns enables early interventions by our nursing staff, which in turn can reduce emergency room visits and hospitalizations for the elders.

Our focus in aging care innovation is not possible without like-minded partners. It’s a collaborative effort with tech innovators, industry leaders, and aging care experts in the field. Just last week, Nazareth Home participated in a panel discussion at Louisville’s Thrive Center through an industry-sponsored event with CDW Healthcare. There, we joined Toi Labs to discuss Nazareth Home’s three-month pilot program with the TrueLoo smart toilet and shared learnings and outcomes from the project.

It’s an exciting time in aging care, and we’re always seeking out the next generation of healthcare technology that enhances wellness for the elders and makes life easier for everyone in our community.

We’re looking for family members whose loved one’s life has been touched by technology in some way at Nazareth Home. If you’d like to share your story, please reach out to Melissa Bailey, Director of Communications, at mbailey@nazhome.org or at (502) 565-8349.

Nazareth Home staff stepping into elders’ shoes with person-centered virtual reality technology

Those of us who have not experienced memory loss can’t understand Alzheimer’s from the perspective of a person living with the disease. It’s also hard to understand end-of-life circumstances without ever being diagnosed with a terminal illness. Yet our caregivers, nurses and staff face these challenges each day. While always compassionate and caring, there has not been a way to truly put our staff in the shoes of the elder faced with these issues, until now.

Recently, the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth awarded a ministry grant to Nazareth Home. This grant funded the purchase of an immersive training platform from Embodied Labs. The software allows our staff to peer into the body and mind of someone confronted with aging issues like cognitive decline such as Alzheimer’s or an elder faced with a terminal prognosis.

Through the platform’s virtual reality experiences, our caregivers are immersed in the elders’ perspectives and conditions, helping them better understand the disease or circumstance. The Alzheimer’s training transports the staff into Beatriz’s life, a middle-aged woman, as she advances through a decade of Alzheimer’s disease. The end-of-life training embodies Clay, a 66-year-old veteran with stage IV terminal lung cancer, as he comes to terms with the reality of his diagnosis.

Through this training, our staff will learn what the elder is feeling and explore the physical, spiritual, and mental changes that may occur. This insight empowers our team to provide more effective and empathetic care. Knowing what to expect, how to relate, and how to respond allows us to communicate more clearly, support more confidently and serve with a greater purpose. Real understanding isn’t just about knowing how to care in certain situations; it’s about feelings. Those feelings are what enhance empathy and compassion.

At Nazareth Home, we focus on achieving outstanding person-centered, innovative and compassionate care. We encompass a holistic approach in our healing ministry, which includes social, spiritual and physical wellness. Our partnership with Embodied Labs’ will enhance our ministry by allowing us to step into someone else’s shoes and understand another person’s experience.

Understanding aging adults’ challenges through a first-person patient perspective builds upon our quality of care. With increased empathy, we will provide better emotional support to our elders and their family members, bringing another layer of excellence to our person-centered approach.