The dog days of February -- effort beyond task. I was in a assisted living/nursing home last week and saw the same golden retriever dog (whose master is the ever-cheerful maintenance guy) and down another hall, a snoozing cat. Here's something I've not seen surveyed -- what percentage of senior housing organizations permit and even encourage pets on the premises and in the presence of seniors? If you know the answer to this question, please contact me!
Apocalypse and opportunity -- the bet is that we're not going to age well. Our favorite gloom-and-doom source, CNBC, has offered up today's Doomsday Boomer Prediction. Those boomers are going to be a healthcare nightmare: "They visit the doctor more, they consume more services, and they aren’t afraid to use their $7 trillion in collective wealth to improve their quality of life.
Outreach to link seniors and computers -- more needed. Although there are multiple approaches to opening up the vast world of the Internet to seniors, rarely do they reach all the way into the home.
The year of the 'care'. As one VC executive, Andy Donner of Physic Ventures, noted recently, this is the year of the 'care'. There seems to be a growing list of vendors who are trying to offer some sort of 'keep in touch' product that connects an older person with family members who may live elsewhere. The basic element is to provide some means to signal 'concerned about you' from family members and obtain the response 'I'm all right' from the older family member back to them -- accompanied by the ability to react in the event that the response is not received.
