Kramer will be honored March 7 in Chicago with the inaugural Career Achievement Award of the new McKnight’s Pinnacle Awards. See mcknightspinnacleawards.com for more information and to purchase tickets.

Q:You’ve said that senior living is approaching a pivot point at which it will begin serving a new generation. How will operators need to change to meet new expectations? 

A: Boomers are much more sophisticated and educated about what they want than their parents were. Mom had accidental longevity. She didn’t expect to live that long. Boomers think, “I may live longer, but I want purposeful longevity.”

Operators are going to have to learn to listen to the customer and not be condescending and paternalistic.

And the biggest change will be that successful operators, in what they offer, are going to be combating and reflecting a different way of thinking about aging and combating the ageism in our society. What it means is moving from what I would call a declinist view of later years to an engagement view of later years. If we don’t change, many boomers are going to see senior living as senior dying, a place you go to die and, therefore, want to avoid as long as you can. We have the opportunity instead to turn our settings into aspirational settings where we are redefining what to expect out of aging.

Q: If you had one piece of advice for senior living owners, operators and leaders, what would it be?

A: Really listen to your customer. Not the customer of the past, but the customer of the future.

Think how long it takes you to retool, to build a new property, to basically conceive of the product, to design it, to deliver it in built infrastructure and to open it. Well, that customer of 2030, they’re going to be here really soon.

And also, with the buildings you have now, are they going to be obsolete? Are the buildings you’re building now going to be attractive to boomers, most importantly because of what happens inside of them? 

I would particularly answer your question with this quote of Bill Gates. He says, “We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next 10. Don’t let yourself be lulled into inaction.”

Are all the things I’m talking about going to happen in the next two years? Absolutely not. But if you think, because of that, they’re not going to happen and you’re going to be lulled into inaction, you’re going to go out of business. You’re either going to be acquired or you’re just going to shut down.

Are the boomers moving into senior care communities right now? No, they’re not there yet. They’re 10 years away from being our customer there. 

But the reason active adult has become such a hot product type is, everyone wants to get brand loyalty now by serving these boomers. But understand, if you’re just seen as offering a care-driven product, you’re the end-stage place of last resort for a boomer. So you’d better change your image.

Don’t be lulled into inaction. Don’t underestimate what’s going to happen in the next 10 years. You do so at your peril.

Q:Is there anything else you’d like to share? 

A: The average senior living operator, from the C-suite to the front line, has come out of the last nearly three years exhausted, overwhelmed. You’re just simply fighting day to day to keep your residents and your staff alive and also survive financially.

I don’t want to make light of that. So many heroes, and so many operators, and so many on the front lines — whether they’re caregivers or dining staff or maintenance — have gone above and beyond, and many are emotionally, physically, mentally just exhausted and financially stressed at the same time.

What I’m saying is, we have huge opportunities in front of us, and we need to focus on these opportunities and how we’re going to position ourselves. I’m incredibly bullish about our field and about the senior housing and care sector. I’m bearish, though, on the ability of many operators to make the pivots they’re going to need to make and to be willing to make the investments they need to make.

This Q&A has been edited for length and other considerations. Listen to the entire interview in this McKnight’s Senior Living Newsmakers podcast. Also see What senior living can learn from the Southwest Airlines debacle.

As long-term care facilities emerge from one of the most challenging periods in the sector’s history, they still find themselves hindered by old problems. Information technology holds the promise to help facilities cope under less-than-favorable operating conditions.

“One of the biggest challenges is the influx of devices,” said Deric Blattenberger, general manager of Senior Care at CenTrak.

“There are more communication tools than ever before, from self-screening tablets that need to be on Wi-Fi to new devices that connect mom to daughter. Every new device needs to connect to some sort of RF [radio frequency] signal, which creates more and more ‘noise’ because consumer products now demand enterprise networks.”

There’s also a plethora of connection issues, said Bill Charnetski, executive vice president of health system solutions and government affairs at PointClickCare.

“We need trusted data frameworks to enable a world in which information sharing is a prerequisite to establish better care,” he said.

As a result of weak investment, long-term care facilities still rely too much on paper, fax machines and other manual processes to enter, find and share clinical information, Charnetski added.

For most IT companies, the wildcard is the workforce.

“One of the biggest constraints today in the healthcare industry is the staffing crisis,” he said.

“It’s easy to think that technology can be a quick fix, but there are key implementation issues like workflow integration and information sharing,” Charnetski added.

The good news, he said, is that size doesn’t matter as much as one might expect.

All organizations, especially those with fewer financial resources, can derive value from augmented interoperability and increased funding, Charnetski said.

Smaller long-term care facilities, or those located in more rural settings, “often have a more robust culture of innovation, as they have had to get creative to manage costs or provide care with fewer supports,” he noted.

» New study touts info tech access and training as ‘transformative’

An innovative public housing partnership reduced loneliness and increased personal connections in the pandemic’s early days.

A new AARP report, “Fly Like an Eagle: Measuring Transformational Social Outcomes Among Seniors Using Technology,” shows how access to technology devices and innovative training programs can be critical for older adults — combating social isolation, loneliness, and depression while improving quality of life.

The report found that participants developed new social contacts or participated in new events at twice the rate of those who didn’t take part.

» EHR study shows value of staff ‘computer time,’ but only to a point

Research by Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston finds that more time spent on an electronic health record system can improve primary care quality outcomes, but there’s a fine line between the right amount and too much.

Studies have found that too much time spent on an EHR can lead to stress and burnout, alongside negative clinical outcomes. New research, meanwhile, finds that more time spent on the EHR, including after hours, can boost quality incomes in primary care. The challenge lies in determining how much time is enough and creating protocols and workflows that enhance that time and
reduce stress.

Researchers pointed out that more time spent on the EHR “may represent a level of thoroughness, attention to detail, or patient and team communication that ultimately enhances certain outcomes.”

» FBI continues to warn healthcare workers of ongoing IT scam

The FBI is warning individuals employed in the healthcare industry of ongoing widespread fraud schemes in which scammers impersonate law enforcement or government officials in attempts to extort money or steal personally identifiable information. The cyberthieves often will spoof authentic phone numbers and names and use fake credentials of well-known government and law enforcement agencies to notify the intended target they were subpoenaed to provide expert witness testimony in a criminal or civil court case. 

» One of the world’s first blood test kits to detect signs of Alzheimer’s disease has been approved in Japan. The approval could lead to quicker and easier diagnoses of the disease, advocates claimed. The amyloid beta measuring product was developed by Sysmex Corp. 

» The Food and Drug Administration did not follow its own protocol in a 2021 decision to approve the Alzheimer’s drug aducanumab (Aduhelm), a US House investigation determined. The news preceded an expected decision on lecanemab, an Alzheimer’s drug in the same anti-amyloid class and involving the same maker.

The report, released Dec. 29, called drugmaker Biogen’s launch plans of aducanumab “aggressive,” its pricing too high and the FDA’s decision to approve it unorthodox. Investigators also criticized the FDA’s broad label indication for aducanumab and Biogen’s acceptance of that label, “despite a lack of clinical data on all Alzheimer’s disease stages and Biogen’s reservations.”

“This report documents the atypical FDA review process and corporate greed that preceded FDA’s controversial decision to grant accelerated approval to Aduhelm,” said Frank Pallone Jr. (D-NJ), chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

» US Senators are asking federal officials to revisit a nine-year-old Medicare determination that severely limits coverage of diagnostic brain scans for dementia. Currently, Medicare will cover one amyloid positron emission tomography scan per lifetime while the patient is enrolled in certain clinical studies. With new evidence supporting the efficacy of those scans for dementia diagnoses, Sens. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) and Edward Markey (D-MA) called for coverage that would support expanded patient access and encourage clinicians to use this technology.

» Blacks and Hispanics in the United States have an outsized risk of Alzheimer’s disease, in part due to vascular risk linked to socioeconomic disadvantage, a new study has found.

Lower incomes and lack of access to health insurance and medical care can lead to vascular-related diseases such as diabetes, hypertension and obesity in midlife and late life. This, in turn, significantly raises the odds of developing Alzheimer’s, according to researchers from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine.

A. Yes, if you want to make data-driven due diligence decisions regarding the feasibility of a new senior living development or the evaluation of an existing community.

If you are trying to determine the overall viability of a new to-be-developed senior living project or continued success of an existing community, then getting a market study is one of the first things you will want to do. A good market study will assist in a thorough understanding of the market area and should provide the following useful information:

1. Definition of the area from which you will draw residents,
2. A demographic and economic/affordability analysis,
3. A detailed evaluation of the existing and planned senior housing competition,
4. Estimates of demand for each living arrangement and
5. Definition of the project characteristics, including the size of the project, unit mix and sizes, pricing, resident services, amenities and features.

The market study can support go/no-go decisions regarding project development, facilitate the participation of other partners in the project and assist in securing financing.

It will provide information for existing operators that are dealing with ongoing economic uncertainty and that are considering important financial and operational changes at their communities. The market study can confirm continued future demand, obtain and compare information on area senior housing competitors and influence strategic planning for the continued success of communities. Strategic planning at existing communities has resulted in changes to the mix of living arrangements, adjustments to pricing, tweaking of service packages, the addition of new units and overall repositioning in the market area.

We’re at the beginning of 2023, so now may be the time for a new market study or an update to an existing mature market study. It is a useful tool that will be used by all members of the senior housing team, including operations, management, design, architectural and marketing team members.

Although it is not the only tool, it is an important first step that will provide necessary and critical market intelligence that will assist in mitigating risk during the overall planning process and increase chances of future success.

Lynne Moore is president of MDS Research Company, a national senior living and healthcare consulting firm based in Fort Worth, TX, that has been serving clients for more than 50 years. MDS is a two-generation company — she is following in Jim Moore’s footsteps. Ms. Moore is responsible for all MDS market research-related projects involving all aspects of senior housing and healthcare. She can be reached at (817) 731-4266 or lynnemoore@m-d-s.com.

This column appeared as “You’ve Got Questions, We’ve Got Answers” in the February 2023 print issue of McKnight’s Senior Living magazine.

The opinions expressed in each McKnight’s Senior Living guest column are those of the author and are not necessarily those of McKnight’s Senior Living.

Have a column idea? See our submission guidelines here.