Elder Experience Lab Updates
Prov Business News Article on BIF Elder Experience Lab
The Providence Business News recently published a great piece about BIF's Elder Experience Lab and our work in medication management.
BIF Executive Director Melissa Withers at TEDX
BIF executive director Melissa Withers recently gave a talk about the BIF Elder Experience Lab at the the inaugural TEDxBoston event. In this video, Melissa reveals insights into how seniors prefer to interact with caregivers, utilize private and shared spaces, care for body and mind, and ultimately, what she thinks the elder experience can (and should) look like.
Elder Experience Lab Explores Opportunity for Multi-Partner Collaboration
The Business Innovation Factory is currently working with partners to coordinate a multi-partner collaboration in the BIF Elder Experience Lab. We believe that this unique collaborative engagement will enhance innovation in elder care and R&D efforts and uncover new revenue generating opportunities for developing transformative solutions that better meet the needs of elders aging-in-place, a market segment that will rapidly increase as baby boomers age and communities replace institution-based elder care with new community-based solutions that enable more elders to age at home.
Join Us in the Elder Experience Lab Online
Please join the Business Innovation Factory’s Elder Experience Lab online forum. We just launched the forum a few days ago and we would love to hear from you. The Lab’s on-line forum offers opportunities for the community to discuss lab activities, participate in specific activities and participate in guided discussions. We invite you to get involved and share your ideas.
Elder Experience Lab Update: Innovation in Medication Management Sorely Needed
Soon after BIF launched the Nursing Home of the Future (NHoF) laboratory, medication (and the management of that medication) clearly emerged as a part of the elder experience that has a big impact on quality of life.
Managing medications can be difficult and confusing for everyone and a great deal of focus has been placed on developing products and systems that help people take the right medicines, at the right time and in the right way. We also know that people with especially complicated medication regimes have come up with thousands of ways to manage medication—from novel ways to store and take their meds to excel spreadsheets and logbooks that bring order to an otherwise confusing routine. Helping elders and aging people manage medications is an important part of helping people maximize the effectiveness of drug therapies and minimize the risks of side effects.
Our work in the NHoF lab has shown us that there is room for improvement in the medication management arena.
Elder Experience Lab Takes on Challenges, Opportunities in Medication Management
The Elder Experience Lab team has created "modules" of activity in the lab devoted to areas of the elder experience most deeply in need of new solutions. The team recently launched a Medication Management module to better understand how elders manage their medications and begin to design and develop new solutions that make the process work and feel better for elders and those that support them.
Elder Experience Lab Update: A New View of the Personal Care Experience
Earlier this winter BIF’s Elder Experience Lab team set out to better understand the experience of personal care for elders. In Phase I, our design observations revealed that personal care routines were especially challenging for even the most able elders, and that the experience needs to be fully redesigned.
