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Argentum Releases Coronavirus Preparation & Response Toolkit

By Prime Care Tech Marketing on Mon, Mar 16, 2020 @ 05:00 PM

Coronavirus fears continue to escalate across the country. As the number of confirmed cases continues to rise, senior care communities are growing increasingly nervous — and rightfully so. In a previous article, we stated that we didn’t believe COVID-19 to be the world-ender that many media outlets were making it out to be. And, while we still don’t believe this is the beginning of the post-apocalyptic societies so many science-fiction movies have warned us about, we can admit that things have taken a more serious turn. Our initial response could potentially be seen as dismissive, and COVID-19 is something that should not be dismissed.

Schools have shut down, closing their doors until April or later. The CDC released a statement that any gatherings of 50 people or more should be cancelled or postponed for at least eight weeks to help slow the spread of the disease. Guidelines released by the White House on March 16th suggested avoiding gatherings of ten or more people. Nursing homes have begun limiting or outright denying guest access to facilities in order to protect their residents, upsetting many families.

In the midst of the escalation, Argentum has released Coronavirus Preparation & Response Toolkit, giving senior care providers a one-stop shop for COVID-19 information and suggestions for dealing with the fallout of this pandemic.

What Resources Are Included?

Argentum’s toolkit includes up-to-date information from the CDC, resources from the U.S. Department of Labor, a preparedness checklist for nursing homes and long-term care settings, and updated guidelines for public health and safety, among other links.

What Can I Do Right Now?

The toolkit also provides an overview and instructions on five critical actions senior care providers and their staffs can take beginning now. The safety of your residents is paramount, and their demographic is the one hardest hit by this disease.

What Other Information Is Included?

The toolkit also includes everything that is known about the virus and the disease it causes so far. You can learn about the disease’s symptoms, how it spreads, and updates on testing availability. It ends with best practice ideas and suggestions for how your community should respond.


We applaud Argentum for putting this toolkit together, taking the time to gather the information and resources available and compile them into one easy-to-access location. You can find Argentum’s Coronavirus Preparation & Response Toolkit right here.

Topics: Argentum coronavirus
2 min read

Addressing Senior Living and Care’s 2016 Agendas with BI

By Prime Care Tech Marketing on Tue, Jan 05, 2016 @ 06:00 PM

Senior Living Care Business IntelligenceIn a recent McKnight’s Senior Living article, the leaders of Argentum, NCAL, and LeadingAge responded to the question of their respective associations’ agendas for 2016. As I read their responses, I opportunely observed that Business Intelligence (BI) can help them effectively address these. For James Balda, President and CEO of Argentum (formerly the Assisted Living Facilities of America [ALFA]), the top issues are workforce development, quality care, operational excellence, and consumer choice. National Center for Assisted Living's (NCAL) Executive Director, Scott Tittle, reports that his organization’s top priorities involve state regulatory issues, workforce development, and, most significantly, “new tools that will help members accumulate data they can use to communicate the quality of care that they provide and to compare themselves with peer providers” with emphasis on quality outcomes. Katie Smith Sloan, President and CEO of LeadingAge, emphasized payment model changes, “whether it's ACOs or bundled payments or creating a network to negotiate with health plans.” A further concern, according to Ms. Sloan, is the lack of unit inventory, creating long waiting lists, and workforce development needs as well.

Taking license to read between the lines, all would likely agree that effective strategies require further research and that further research requires actionable information from reliable and timely data sources. This requires a robust data mining and business intelligence solution. Such a solution not only allows for the storage of critical data in data warehouses, but the retrieval, aggregation, and dissemination of such data converted to useful Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) which can be used internally or shared with other healthcare stake holders and investors.

Let’s take operational excellence, for example. Whether you call it “operational excellence” or “quality of care” perhaps, or positioning facilities to “negotiate with health plans”, having fresh, up-to-date information about the quality of clinical services, the costs to provide the services, and the labor required creates an advantage. Providers can respond to today’s issues today with an eye on the future. It also fosters the sharing of information that providers and their respective associations need to address these issues effectively. With BI, the information is already available and easily digestible.

How do you eat the elephants of workforce development, compliance, operational excellence, and payment model changes? One “byte” of data at a time. Accumulated and properly served, BI-generated KPIs can sustain such initiatives with energy and focus over the long haul.

Make Business Intelligence part of your 2016 strategic plan! 

Business Intelligence

Topics: business intelligence ACOs Key Performance Indicators BI KPIs health plans workforce development data retrieval, aggregation, and dissemination NCAL operational excellence LeadingAge Argentum

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