In light of the current challenges the country’s elder care system faces and the many babyboomers that are aging, the Business Innovation Factory has started the fascinating Nursing Home of the Future initiative to design and test new ideas for improving elder care in a working nursing home / assisted living facility. Working with Tockwotton Home, a 30-bed assisted living center and 42-bed skilled nursing facility located in Providence, Rhode Island they assembled a team of designers, clinicians and elder care experts to start creating a detailed description of the current experience of nursing home and assisted-living residents.

From the summary of their findings:

We know that we can and must do better by our elders. We know there is a better way to deliver care to those elders who can no longer live with full independence. The residents and staff at Tockwotton Home have taught us us that opportunities for intervention and innovation are everywhere—in health and wellness management, in environmental improvements, in developing tools that give residents more comfort or more independence, and in virtually every aspect of the underlying infrastructure of the nursing care model.

Click here to read the full article.

Not only did they summarize their process and findings in writing, we encourage you to click here to look at the pictures they took and click here to watch a video about what they have done, who they have met and what they have discovered during this journey. Please leave any thoughts and comments below.