Why is it so difficult to get AIP technology in the door? Senior living providers and senior home care agencies want to adopt eldercare technology into their daily activities. AgeTech California is a joint effort is to assist providers in implementing proven, cost-effective technologies that will increase the efficiency of care and the quality of life for clients receiving care.  At Mary Furlong’s recent Boomer Venture Summit, Joanne Handy from Aging Services of California, one of the AgeTechCA partners, presented a slide that every AIP tech vendor should heed.

Blah, blah, blah, but no evidence or facts. She noted that senior living providers hear buzz from vendors about their products and services that includes these unsubstantiated statements:

· It will give you a marketing advantage

· It will decrease your labor costs

· It will lower adverse outcomes (falls, medication adherence, hospitalizations)

· It will save you $$$

She went on to note that senior living providers want to hear facts and specifics from AIP tech vendors:

· This solution ranks nth in reasons consumers choose a community

· Here’s an example of a setting in which it saved labor costs (and what costs it saved)

· Here are studies where this is demonstrated

· Here’s the cost/benefit analysis

Or, in other words, providers want factual evidence that your product or service works and that you’ve piloted it in a viable comparison capacity. And, they want to know exactly how it will fit into their situation, where they can achieve savings or lower labor costs (or provide a better working environment.)

Don’t mess with the workflow. She went on to say that local site champions for products or service are essential and multiple stakeholders must be committed. She also pointed out that products should require little staff workflow or behavior change. Vendors should have a step-by-step planning methodology in place that the living providers can use. And, vendors must provide technology training and support as needed.

For example, Coro Health, who has recently launched a line of AIP music-therapy products, has proven its product value to providers through a rigorous clinical trial. “Creating an almost omnipresent musical atmosphere directed at the musical preferences and listening histories of residents in an assisted living facility reduces average levels of agitation and depression throughout the facility.”

The early bird gets the worm but the second mouse gets the cheese. Well-established senior living providers should be a core target of AIP tech vendors. But, it is up to the vendors to prove that their product won’t trap the senior living providers into becoming the first mouse.

Susan Estrada is the founder of Happy@Home, a new product testing and review site, and will offer her perspective in this blog from time to time.