Smart Technology with Stephanie Cameron

*The following is the output of transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.

And Welcome back to the program everyone. We are here with a very special guest, Stephanie Cameron, who is a registered nurse and the CEO of transitions care management here in western Washington. Stephanie, welcome again to the program thank you so very much, Stephanie. I am excited about our our topic today because we all know we’re in a technology central area here in greater puget sound, but a lot of us may think that that doesn’t really apply to seniors, because seniors don’t use computers a lot and all those things. And yet technology now today does so much more than that and I’m excited to know that you’re going to talk about that today. Yeah, absolutely, and you know, yeah, our seniors can be intimidated by the computers in the ipads and the smartphones and that type of thing. You know, even you know flip phones can be overwhelming for them sometime. They sure can be. But when it comes to integrating technology into our care of seniors, there’s so many great products out there that don’t have to be intimiding to our seniors. In fact, some of them can be virtually invisible to our seniors and still allow them to remain safely at home for as long as possible and and what I understand, I took care of my mom, you know, from two thousand and five to two thousand eleven. Right, not too long ago, but, for Technology Sake, a long time ago. Yeah, right. So you know what used to be available for my mom when she had to move to expensive assisted living. There’s a lot of things out there and services out there today that are available for seniors so they can stay in their homes even longer and have that independence. So, Stephanie, tell me a little bit about some of the things that technology can do today. Yeah, absolutely so. If, let’s say you have a home where the senior wants to remain independent without care givers, they’re not at the point yet of needing that at a sure support, or should I say, of wanting that additional so right, children may feel they need it, but that’s a different story, right. So I’ll give you an example. I had a client who we came on board. She was virtually a hundred percent non compliant in taking her medications. She had some memory loss and just wasn’t just did not remember to take them and had thyroid levels that, we’re just completely out of control, which affected so many aspects of her life. Of course, came in and didn’t evaluation and we put a medication reminder set in her house, which is an electronic medication box that ended up and and and had this little alarm go when they want home to take her medications. And she went from you know, not take your medications to, within two months of taking them virtually every single time she was supposed to, and her climary levels coming back to normal. Now. If she was going to, if a family were going to purchase a system like that, because I’m sure there’s a lot of us out there that have parents that aren’t necessarily very compliant about taking their meds. From what is something like that cost? Roughly, yeah, so the system that we currently use runs around seventy five a month, and what the system does is not easing. Not only does it alert the person, but the family members or care managers will get text messages saying a box was taken out at the wrong time or they didn’t take their medication today. So you can do immediate follow up. Oh, that’s amazing, really wonderful product. Yeah, that’s awesome. So so that and and just to think about the other thing. I think that happens is sometimes they double take their medication because they forget they talked took it. Is that, I’m sure, another part of it? Yep, exactly exactly, and there is actually systems in place to help keep that from happening as well within that same system that we use. That’s awesome, wonderful, that’s awesome. So what other ways can technology help? Yeah, so there’s other products out there on the market that are, you know, very almost invisible monitoring systems, and you can monitor whether somebody’s taking pills out of their pill bottles. You can monitor how many times they open the fridge, what doors they go in and out of, you can monitor their sleep patterns, and this is all without the scene, you really even seeing that it’s going on. Sure, sure, and so, yeah, it’s just some great technology. And what’s incorporated with these technologies is our ability to track these things. And so when we see, let’s say, for instance, on one of our older individuals, they’re getting out of bed fifteen times during the night, whereas normally they’re a good sleeper, me, as a care manager, first thing I’m thinking is, does this person have a uti because right that’s where our heads goes nurses and correct. It’s right. For sure. It alerts us to a potential situation before it because are they sleep walking or are they? You know, are they not? You know, they rent their restless? Is Their stress factors? Is a depression? The other thing, I’m sure, the other side of it, is, are they sleeping too much? You know, they sleeping all day because they’re depressed? Right, I’m sure that there’s a lot of ways in which to monitor that. Yeah, now how is that specifically monitored? Ut and Mont is that? Is it like? You don’t wire the bed, do you? What do you do? And now you know. So the one system that we use actually has a little electronic bluetooth device that just kind of sits on the mattress underneath the sheets, and so it’s it’s you know, it’s not a princess in peace situation, so that you know, the scene here is going to keep them awake. Yeah, but it is. It’s a great, effective monitoring tool. That’s amazing. You know, we for many years relied on the pendance, the fall alert pendance and that type of thing, which you know, are great. I still use it, I still recommend them very highly, but you know, we just have so much more that we can sure, sure you know, there’s home glucoset monitoring, a blood pressure monitoring the actually sends results to a family caregiver or a care manager on the spot. So pretty things. Awesome. Ye. So, and and obviously when you put something like that in the house, it does it work through like the Internet, through wireless technology? Do you have to have an Internet hook up or how does that work? Yeah, some doing, some don’t. Okay, the telephoneline, yeah, the medication system that we use has its own internet or its own Internet connection. So okay, it does not rely on an inhouse one. The monitoring system that I was referring to, that’s got the little censors you can put around the house, and you do need to have an interconnection and a right for that one, for the to enable the Bluetooth, okay, and Wi fi capabilities. Yeah, okay, that’s awesome. So you know, I know, and and this is just something that we that we talk about a lot, is fall prevent MMM, yes, and before you know, as I I’m going to have you think about it. And while you’re thinking about that, we are talking to Stephanie Cameron, to is a registered nurse. She is a CEO of transitions care management. She is a care manager and Stephanie is amazing. And we’re talking about technology today. So if somebody’s going to how, you know, how can technology help a senior in falls or to prevent false oh boy, so there’s a there’s a lot of different ways. I’m trying to think of which. which way am I going to go first? So, you know, one of the what are the areas of falls is falling out, you know, in bed, getting right bed. You know, there’s certainly technology there between mats that are on the floor, mats that lie on the mattress at the older at that are difference in throw rugs everyone that are different than through. Yeah, and you know, but fall prevention really comes down to other things, such as the first thing I look at is fluid and a nutritional intake. Right. We see a much higher risk of falls when people don’t have proper food and fluid. So linking that to how that works with technology, is these monitoring system that I was telling you about that had the sensors throughout. You can put a sensor on a water pitcher know how much that person is picking up that water picture. That’s important. Yeah, but the sensor on the fridge. Now you don’t know what they’re taking out of the fridge and actually eating, but you know, we do know that they’re accessing the fridge. It’s amazing. I you know, I’ve heard now that there’s devices that you can put inside your refrigerator to see what you need in the store. Now, if that’s I heard that to me, I know it’s like crazy. Right, I like the technology that’s after but I don’t know. What do you know about smart pit panels? I’m just curious like that. When people put a smart panel in a home, how does that help seniors? You know, that’s a good question. I am not up up today on that technology. Okay, so I can’t speak. Okay, speak to that one, all right. Well, I know that’s a big deal with a lot of homes, like high end homes and most certainly. I know now the great thing about smart panels is they can be programmed to do just about anything and certainly went a lot of this monitoring and things like that that you’re instead of paying a service, there’s a lot of things that can be done internally in a house to so that’s the other side of it. Obviously, is kind of self containing it, so you’re not doing it that way. So exactly. Yeah, and you know, with the with the advent of the Internet of things, I wot it’s you know, it would make sense that more and more of these technologies and things to keep our older generation safer will come together well, and not to mention services like tele a health. There’s a there’s a whole are aspect now of especially seniors that are that are at home. You can can now get doctors on the phone, which is wonderful, or on your screen on your computer and you can talk to them remotely. That’s a big deal. I love that. Yeah, I think that’s wonderful. Yeah, it really is. And and having the ability now, I mean just you know, we talked about the Internet and what that brings up for seniors. I don’t are you familiar with former Seahawk Jordan Babina. I am. Jordan is starting a pro guy company that is like an Uber for seniors and he came up to me like a year ago and said, Suzanne, I need to talk to you about this. So we’re going to definitely have him on the show one of these days, because he is that he’s training all of his staff to be you know, like care to CNA certification, so they’ll have that, that real good solid background, and then having vehicles and having the ability now to transport seniors do like doctors appointments and things like that, and it’s going to be all run through, you know, a tablet, very simple APP that they can push on a button and I have a doctor’s appointment. Very simple. Oh, there’s exam being wonderful. So he was sharing with me about you know, really there isn’t anything out there, and that’s specifically for seniors except, you know, for the hide shuttle or, you know, getting a cabulence or a town car or something like that. So this is another option that I think is brilliant. That’s great. That’s fantastic. Yeah, I know there’s a program out there called go, go, grandparent, if you’ve not heard of that, that I get to. It’s also an uber based, very simple to use APP. Now they do not have. I don’t believe it’s CNAS that are that are the yeah, he’s trained on his staff. That’s fantastic. Yeah, they am excited to hear more about that. I am too. I I mean we we’ve got to get him in because he said he was almost ready to go and that, course, that was over the holidays, so he’d better be ready to go Jordan. So, if you’re listening out there, we’ve had a couple of alumni on the programs, though you never know. Well, Stephanie, how do we reach you? Yeah, absolutely. My phone number is area code to zero six two hundred and ninety three, three zero seven eight. My email is Stephanie at transitions cemcom and the website is transitions care managementcom. Stephanie, thank you so much for being on the program thank you so much