LAS CRUCES, N.M., June 12, 2023 – Today the national health technology company Electronic Caregiver announces its partnership with Western Home Communities in Cedar Falls, Iowa, to offer its Virtual Caregiver platform, Addison Care, to members of the organization’s Fortified Life program.
Fortified Life is a continuing care retirement community (CCRC) “without walls.” Members receive home-based services to help them age independently, wherever they call home. And now, Addison Care will be one of the services offered to members who need it.
“The Western Home and Electronic Caregiver partnership represents a shared understanding of the need for versatile approaches to wellness,” said Electronic Caregiver Lead UX/UI Designer Morgan Beasley. “Our management platform allows Western Home the visibility they seek when working with their program members to maintain health, while their members get to enjoy and benefit from additional program assistance via Addison Care.”
Addison Care, released to market in January 2023, features a 3D-animated Virtual Caregiver that acts as a constant companion for the aging and chronically ill. Clients can interact with Addison through voice and touch via a Lenovo IdeaCentre All-in-One computer or Yoga convertible tablet in their home. Addison Care offers a world of experience, a world of connectivity, and a world of benefits that can be curated to fit each customer’s specific needs.
Through Fortified Life presented by Western Home Communities, Addison Care will provide customized reminders along with regular active living and wellness surveys to keep members healthy, safe, and connected. Fortified Life members will also have access to Addison’s fun features, which help clients stay engaged in their care plan. For example, the Virtual Caregiver can mirror time of day, weather, holiday celebrations, and faith within the management platform. Additionally, clients can enjoy personalizing Addison’s home, ethnicity, locations, and apparel. They can also interact with objects, animals, musical instruments, media, and characters in Addison’s world.
“We are constantly thinking about active aging and what that looks like,” Fortified Life Director Amanda Lynch said. “We really are always on the cutting edge – clearly, with Addison and our partnership. We feel that by having a virtual presence with folks, they are going to feel better longer and be able to age in place, which really is our main goal.”
With Addison Care, Western Home can keep a closer watch on the health and wellbeing of their members, checking in remotely as needed.
“Addison, offered in conjunction with other Fortified Life services, allows people to age the way they would like to, by their own design,” Lynch said. “Not every solution is for everyone, and we know that, but we feel like the pieces that we have right now with Addison are going to be a great solution for a lot of our members.”
Initially, Addison Care will be available to 25 Fortified Life members, but that number is expected to grow over time. The end goal is to offer Addison Care as a solution to any member who enters the program that it is a good fit for. In the future, Western Home may also extend the offer to non-Fortified Life residents.
“Addison can really transform a community, just from the standpoint of being able to have good data, good analytics, being able to have a value add, being able to say to a family member, ‘We’ve got this, we’re here for you,’” Lynch said.
Since 2021, Western Home has also offered Electronic Caregiver’s Premier medical alert device to Fortified Life members who can benefit from emergency response services.
Electronic Caregiver developed Addison Care not only as a flexible solution for holistic retirement communities, like Western Home, but also for pure clinical health situations and individual use. Other Addison Care capabilities include assisting clients in recording vital sign measurements to monitor specific health conditions, sharing health data with connected providers, caregivers, and family members, and contacting first responders in an emergency. Addison will continue to evolve with new features added every quarter. Future updates include the addition of a wider selection of Virtual Caregiver avatars, physical and mental health routines, and video televisits with health care professionals. On the clinical side, Addison configurations are being created for bedside patient management in hospitals, such as intake and discharge processes.
About Electronic Caregiver
Founded in 2009, Electronic Caregiver is a privately held digital health technology and services company headquartered in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Electronic Caregiver’s mission is to design and deliver innovative, impactful telehealth products and services that bridge the chasm between the doctor’s office and patient’s home to improve outcomes, expand access, and optimize resource allocation. Electronic Caregiver has been qualified as a technology solution provider in the AWS Partner Network (APN). The company’s solutions are available to individual customers, as well as through health care organizations, physician practices, care management firms, homecare agencies, and senior housing providers to deliver hospital-at-home, chronic care management, and remote patient monitoring programs.
About Western Home Communities & Fortified Life
Western Home Communities, located in Cedar Falls, Iowa, is a charitable Christian service organization that assertively creates fulfilling lifestyles for those it serves, their families, and its employees. Western Home offers active living, independent living, assisted living, nursing care, skilled care, and memory care through a wide range of care options and communities.
Fortified Life, started in 2020, is a membership program designed to maximize older adults’ ability to stay in their home as they age. The program includes a suite of services that scale to meet their current and future needs.