Until the beginning of 2018, the gait behavior of residents at the DOMICIL Seniorenresidenz Gotlindestraße Berlin was assessed with very traditional means – that is, until Quality Management Officer Torsten Skora introduced the Lindera Mobility Analysis to the facility.

Mobility analyzes are now carried out on site, for example in the resident’s room. All you need is a smartphone and the Lindera app. The precise, technology-supported analysis thus complements the specialist knowledge and experience of the nursing staff –
to the benefit of the residents and the quality of care. The nursing staff also save valuable time, which they can invest in talking to the elderly, advising on fall prevention, and putting together group interventions.

Digitization in care

Our society is ageing. Caring for senior citizens thereby becomes one of the most important future industries. Unfortunately, we already have a shortage of around 25,000 nursing staff to keep up with the positive social development. To keep the quality of care at the highest level, to relieve specialists, and to further increase the well-being of the elderly, facilities have to break new ground. The DOMICIL Seniorenresidenz Gotlindestraße also recognized this.
Torsten Skora is the Quality Management Officer at the facility and is looking for innovative methods to continuously develop care. He tests new digital solutions together with nursing staff, residents and relatives. Among these digital solutions, since the beginning of 2018, is also the smartphone-based Lindera Mobility Analysis, with which he is doing important pioneering for the 38 other DOMICIL senior residences throughout Germany.

Falling represents a high risk of injury for older people and people with limited mobility. A meticulous analysis is essential to prevent falls. For this reason, Torsten Skora attended the “Sturz” workshop hosted by AOK Nordost, where he met Diana Heinrichs, Founder and Managing Director of Lindera. Up until that point in time, geriatric assessments for fall prevention were still done traditionally in the facility – a time-consuming process in which four pages had to be completed in writing and the analysis was based on a purely subjective assessment.

Expertise and innovative technology for individual care

That all changed with the introduction of Lindera: Mobility analyzes were now being carried out with the free Lindera app and a smartphone. Because all the Lindera Mobility Analysis requires is a 30 to 40-second cell phone video recording of the senior citizen’s gait behavior and to fill out a short psychosocial questionnaire. Both are then expediently and precisely analyzed with the assistance of artificial intelligence. This also includes the recommendation of specific, customized measures for fall prevention in accordance with the expert standard. Thereby, the treatment is tailored specifically to the needs of the individual resident.

“In this way, the treatment is tailored specifically to the needs of the individual resident. The nursing staff’s trained eye gets support from pinpoint technology – a really precise and objective assessment of the respective fall risk was previously not feasible with the traditional analysis,” explains Torsten Skora. “The technology-supported process also saves valuable time, which we can now use to talk to residents and derive individual measures to prevent falls.”

High level of acceptance and excitement for technology – also among residents

The residents of the nursing home are also very interested in the new method. They carry out the Mobility Analysis with no fear of technology at all – on site. That is what Torsten Skora says is the big advantage from the senior citizen’s point of view. “They can do the mobility test in their own room, in a familiar environment. This makes them feel freer than they would in the clinic or lab, for example.” The feedback after the analyses was very positive every time: For the first time, thanks to the Lindera app, residents can really see themselves and their movements objectively. They also receive a written evaluation with the analysis, which they can discuss with their relatives – and suitable preventive measures.

Lighthouse with radiance

The Gotlindestraße nursing home is the first DOMICIL Senior Residence Hamburg SE facility to use the Lindera Mobility Analysis. Torsten Skora continuously trains the nursing staff at the facility in how to use the Lindera Mobility Analysis: “We plan to use the app even more and, if possible, at even more of our locations in the future, in order to further develop our quality management and the dialogue with the health insurance companies.” However, to do so, some groundwork is first required: It’s less about carrying out the analyzes than about expanding the technical infrastructure in nursing homes. To support facilities on their way to digitization, the Lindera app offers the option of first saving data on a cell phone and then uploading it for analysis later on. This is a helpful function since not all senior residences have WiFi available everywhere.

Torsten Skora’s summary is clear: “With the technology, we can work much more specifically and individually with the elderly and thereby also support our nursing staff so much better.” But he also knows: Care cannot and should not work without human beings. However, technology can provide wonderful support to specialists. “We can’t ignore that, the industry has to advance accordingly. Ultimately, we can all benefit from it – after all, it’s going to affect all of us at some point.”

About the facility

The goal of the DOMICIL Senior Residences Hamburg SE is to ensure that the residents stay “in the midst of things” at their facilities. That’s why the company only operates modern old age and nursing homes at selected locations, which enable residents to continue having active lives. The facilities are in the heart of the city and can be easily reached by public and private transport. Doctors and shops are always close by. In addition to Schleswig-Holstein, Lower Saxony, Hesse, Rhineland-Palatinate, Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria, the company also operates senior nursing homes in Berlin and Hamburg.