Thought Leadership

According to the 2013 Profile of Older Americans presented by the Administration On Aging (AOA), the elderly are less likely to change residence than any other group. They desire to remain within the home and the community that is most familiar rather than relocate to a new community, county or state. A support system is critical to allow for quality of life and aging in place to properly occur. Without this structure institutionalization becomes a necessity

• 28% of community resident Medicare beneficiaries age 65+ report difficulty in performing one or more ADLs (activities of daily living; examples include bathing, dressing, eating)
• An additional 12% report difficulty with one or more IADL’s (instrumental activities of daily living; examples include shopping, managing money, taking medication)

As a community, we need to ensure places and systems are designed to allow seniors to age in place.

PACE and Adult Day programs are quickly stepping in to help fill the void and provide a higher level of structure and support. The National Adult Day Services Association (NADSA) and National PACE Association (NPA) both report an increasing need for these services nationwide. With 5,685 adult day care programs reported in 2014 by the NADSA and 110 PACE centers reported by NPA as of March 1, 2015 the numbers are on the rise and the community need and desire for these type of services are more present than ever.

What works today will not likely work in five, ten or fifteen years down the road.

With the ever evolving baby boomer demographic now entering the next phase of life and having very differing social needs then the generation before them, understanding and planning is a critical step in the integration and design process. Continuing to build what works for today will almost certainly not work tomorrow. To that end, Progressive AE set out to find answers and hosted a day long community forum where stakeholders engaged in a visioning event focusing on the future of PACE and Adult Day.

Participants were hand selected ensuring we captured a vast array of experience and insight working with seniors and senior living facilities. The group was thoroughly engaged. Lively dialogue, thought sharing and future forecasting filled the air around topics such as:

• Transportation
• Technology
• Shifting family dynamics
• Increase in physical and cognitive impairments
• Service location
• Size of facility
• Cost of construction

So what’s next? Where do we go from here?

We have compiled a visioning synthesis from the community forum which is packed with statistics, insights, passion, and potential solutions available here: