PALs Assisted Living Software

New Hampshire Assisted Living Assessment

2011-11-21T10:54:00.000-06:00

PALs has added New Hampshire's, "Resident Assessment Tool / Needs Determination" form.
This once again demonstrates PALs flexibility with its User-Defined Assessment tool.
For a FREE trial, visit our website at www.PALsSoftware.com

Staff Credentialing in Assisted Living

2011-06-23T07:35:00.002-06:00

Assisted Living Communities are required by regulations to verify a variety of staff credentialing from criminal background checks to tuberculosis testing. How to keep track of them all, and add an agency's own requirements?

PALs approaches this through the assessment process and a customized report. Our assessment library now contains a Staff Credentialing template that you can customize for your state and agency and print reports telling you what documentation is missing, or when CPR training is due, or when a license is about to expired.

See video below for more information, and to try this process yourself, simply download PALs FREE Trial from our website at www.PALsSoftware.com

Click HERE for video of PALs Credentialing Process.

Georgia's PHYSICIAN’S MEDICAL EVALUATION FOR ASSISTED LIVING

2011-06-07T07:19:00.000-06:00

PALs has completed another state's assisted living assessment.

PALs library of user-defined assessment now contains Georgia's "Physician's Medical Evaluation". This form not only contains the required data, but also is formated to look like the state's form.

To review this form and the entire PALs assisted living products, visit our website at www.PALsSoftware and download our FREE trial.

Staffing and Profits for Assisted Living Communities

2011-03-09T10:33:00.003-06:00

To be profitable, you simply need to keep your revenue greater than your expenses. In Assisted Living, income can be divided into three groups; property related, food costs, and staff costs - providing assisted living services. I will focus on staff, the largest of the three groups.

To relate resident fees to services, we need to use the common denominator of time. Regardless of the service (ADL Assist, bath, escort, etc.), it involves staff time. And resident's needs or preferences may require more or less staff time. For example, one resident may "want" (not need) a staff person to remain with them during a bath for reassurance, while another resident may only want assistance while stepping into the bath. The former situation may require 45 minutes of staff time, while the latter only require 15 minutes.

In addition to direct staff time for a service, we also need to add in administrative overhead, defined as costs related to payroll, staff hiring/training, supervision plus a little profit. By adding in these related costs, each staff person becomes a profit center.

Next we need to add in a cost for Shift Productivity. This is the difference between the total shift hours (8 hours) and the direct service hours (6 hours of direct care to residents) or 6/8 = 75% shift productivity. In this scenario, we need to add 2 hours to the cost of our staff person to get an accurate cost.

So if we pay our direct care staff $10 per hour, plus 35% administrative overhead plus shift productivity of 75% (leaving 25% to add into costs) we get a total cost of 10 + 3.50 + 2.50 = $16.00 / 4 = $4.00 per 15 minutes of direct care.

Now we need to assess each resident for the amount of time they need or want for a service and either sell them the service directly (Ala Carte), or combine a number of services into a package of care. For example, you might have a Basic Assisted Living Package of 3 hours per week; Package A provides 6 hours per week; and other packages depending on service time. Note how this model is both transparent and easily documented. We're not assessing "needs", which can be difficult to explain as it involves professional judgement, rather both resident/family and staff can agree to minutes of care. When a resident is documented as using additional hours of care a care conference is scheduled to explain the need to move to the appropriate level of care.

Managing staff is also simplified. The staff scheduler is given the "Shift Productivity" level and told to schedule accordingly. By monitoring the shift schedule, we ensure profits. In addition, if staff want more hours, they need to "create a customer" or sell their services, and if they provide more care than they document or report (service creep) they will find themselves overworked. If they complain about how hard they work, you show them the total direct care minutes for their shift assignments and ask them where the discrepancy is (who is getting more time than documented).

I think you will see staff morale improve under this system, as they are all working with the same shift-productivity ratio, another words, each shift has approximately the same number of direct care minutes. If someone want to work more hours, increase their shift from 4 to 6 hour for example, they only need to demonstrate the need (or create a customer for their time).

The entire process above can be supervised by management by reviewing the shift productivity schedule when the staff work schedule is released and ensuring that the actual daily schedule reflects the posted staff schedule.

Of course, PALs give you all the tools you need to setup the above. We have a service pricing tool which calculates the staff's hourly wages + Adm Overhead + Shift Productivity = Total Staff Cost per hour. PALs also has a resident assessment form to calculate resident costs (either ala carte or packages). PALs will create a weekly staff work schedule; daily shift assignment sheets; and monthly documentation sheets to record variations to the minutes of care. Finally, PALs will create a monthly invoice for resident care that is supported by a paper trail from Service Agreement to Service Documentation.

PALs can also be setup to record staff time and service documentation electronically. This way, a report is easily generated noting the variation in service minutes for each resident.

For a free trial of this "System of Care" go to our website, www.PALsSoftware.com and download a free trial of PALs Executive.

DOH 4397 ALR Personal Data and Resident Evaluation - NY

2011-03-01T19:15:00.001-06:00

It's done! We've added form 4397 for New York users to our assessment library.

This form, needed to look-like the form provided by the Department of Health. All eight pages were included, in two parts. Hence, Sections 1-2 and Sections 3-7 can be completed and printed separately.

To view this form, go to our website at www.PALsSoftware.com and download the free trial of PALs Executive. When you call for an Activation Code, simply request that the New York assessment be emailed to you. Enjoy ~

Exceeding Users Expectations

2011-02-08T09:09:00.000-06:00

I just love it when a user calls with a request, and we can immediately meet it.

This week a user called saying they were just surveyed, and the surveyors gave her two forms to complete which essentially guided the process. The request was for PALs to computerize the forms, so they could do an internal audit monthly to be sure they were always in compliance.

Because PALs allows for user-defined assessments and user-defined QA projects, the data entry form was easily created, and can be easily edited by our user. The finished report was customized to look like the surveyors guide so they could share information in a familiar format.

Don’t Buy Assisted Living Software!

2010-11-09T10:03:00.001-06:00

You don’t really want to buy assisted living software, what you want to do is find a solution to a problem and put systems in place to ensure resident-centered quality care.

For example, if you want to improve your medication management, and put a system in place to ensure medication orders are renewed as needed and the medications administered (and documented) as orders, you may want to consider PALs Medication Manager.

If you want to ensure that Resident service agreements meet standards, that services are given as agreed, and invoiced appropriately, PALs Executive would put the necessary systems in place. With this system, your organization integrity is protected as you will be doing what you agreed to do in the resident service agreements. PALs will print a daily shift assignment sheet for workers, so they what services to provide, and a documentation form to note conformity, or any variations.

If you are concerned about meeting other regulatory compliance issues, such as staff credentialing or training; or needs to supervise a residents plan of care or physician orders by certain dates, PALs has the systems for you.

If you may need to ensure that resident assessments meet regulatory requirements, and your agency’s needs. With PALs, you can create and customize your own assessments.

Finally, if you are finding it difficult to remain profitable, PALs has a one report that will monitor profitability, so you can review it when staff schedules are released, and monitor it daily for compliance. See 7 Steps to Profitability below.

To download a FREE trial of PALs, simply go to www.PALsSoftware.com .

Michigan Assessment Plan for AFC Residents

2010-08-11T10:02:00.005-06:00

Last week we had two requests to include Michigan's Assisted Living Assessment in our assessment library. Since we pride ourselves on listening to our customers, this assessment is now included.

PALs offers user-defined assessments for when the content is more important than the format. But when you want a specific format, so it looks like a specific form, a custom assessment is created and saved in our library.

To review this and other assessments, simply go to www.PALsSoftware.com and download our FREE PALs Executive trial.

Rent Roll report for Assisted Living Communities

2010-03-16T07:20:00.004-06:00

PALs has added a new report to our over 100 reports to consolidate data into what is commonly known as a "Rent Roll" for Assisted Living Communities.

A Rent-Role report is a monthly report showing all units or apartments, occupied and vacant, and the related revenue that is generated by each occupied apartment. This report further divides the revenue into Services and Non-Service related categories.

What makes our Rent Roll unique, is that we follow this report with a follow-up report showing where the Service Revenue originates (what specific services or service packages are most popular) and the related staff costs to provide these services. So the final BALANCE after charges column tells us what services we provide most profitably.

For a short video of this report, click HERE and visit our website at www.PALsSoftware.com to download a trial copy for your review.

Assisted Living Activities

2010-02-16T16:08:00.005-06:00

PALs has extended it's support for Activities program. You can now enter an activity, select days of week, and PALs will automatically enter the event into an events calendar.

So if you have a M/W/F exercise program, you enter the event, "Exercise" and click in Monday, Wednesday, Friday then set the date, 3/1/2010 to 3/31/2010, and PALs will automatically enter the events for the appropriate dates and print the Activity Schedule for March.

In addition, when residents attend an event, an attendance sheet is printed for documentation. Later, or in real-time, you can enter the residents who attended, and repeat for other residents, with a single push of a button. You can then print a resident activity report for any time period entered.

For more information, or to download a free trial of PALs and try it yourself, visit our website at www.PALsSoftware.com

Texas Resident Assessment Form

2010-02-16T16:00:00.005-06:00

PALs is pleased to announce that the Resident Assessment form for Texas has been added to the assessment forms library.

Texas regulations require that residents be assessed along 23 domains (A-T), but does not provide a form. PALs now provides that form. This form is user-defined, so programs may add additional items.

For more information, go to www.PALsSoftware.com and download a FREE trial of our PALs Executive program, the complete Assisted Living operations software.

MAR with Picture

2010-01-19T09:42:00.007-06:00

We have been repeatedly asked to add a picture to our MARs and we have now done so. The primary reason for adding pictures is to help ensure that the medication is given to the right resident. The picture helps staff, particularly new staff, identify residents.

To view our MAR with Pictures click HERE.

Mailing Lists, Labels, and Letters

2009-12-15T08:28:00.008-06:00

This is the time of year to send out seasonal greeting, and maybe information on your foundation, or a monthly newsletter.

PALs makes it easy to print mailing labels, for any addresses entered. For example, Residents' contacts, physicians, pharmacies, and staff, all permit printing of labels, letters, or even emails.

Download a FREE trial of PALs Executive today and take a look. www.PALsSoftware.com

Assisted Living Pricing & Profits

2009-12-13T12:36:00.006-06:00

Assisted Living operations usually categorize income into three streams: Housing, Food, and Services. This discussion is meant to address Services (the heart of assisted living).

In summary, management is buying staff time at an hourly rate, then adding value (training, supervision, setting, etc.) and reselling staff time in 15 minutes units for resident cares. Hopefully, if you use monthly package pricing, the packages are based on minute of care.

So if you price your 15 minute of service to include:

1. wage related expenses including taxes and benefits (fully-loaded).
2. Administrative Overhead to include supervision, training, etc.
3. ROI - Return on Investment to convert staff time to a profit center!
4. Shift Productivity = Resident Service Hours divided by shift hour. So if a shift is 8 hours long, and includes 6 hours of direct resident care, 6/8 = .75 (75%) shift productivity. Hence, 100% - 75% = 25% non-productivity factor. The .25 is used in the following calculations. This step ensures that the full 8 hour shift is paid.

Plugging in the numbers; if your fully-loaded wage related costs are $14.00 per hour then:

$3.50 per 15 minutes ($14.00/4)
+0.88 (3.50 x .25 = 100% - 75% = 25% shift non-productivity factor)
$4.38
+1.53 = 4.38 x .35 (admin overhead, 15% + ROI, 20% = 35%)
$5.91 = price per 15 minutes of service

Once you set your shift productivity by policy, and create your staff work schedule accordingly, your service side of the business is on track to create profits. Staff scheduling becomes the critical focus that needs to be managed and measured each week.

PALs includes templates to do the above calculations, and reports to review the shift productivity and resident service plan profitability.

Visit PALs Software website and download a FREE 7 day trial and calculate your price points.

Care Management in Assisted Living

2009-11-13T09:10:00.003-06:00

PALs software supports the following 5-step process of Care Management (or Case Management) in Assisted Living Settings.

1. Resident Assessment - To identify resident needs. In most states an RN does this assessment, other states permit a "manager's assessment".

2. Service Negotiation - identifying which assessed needs will be met and how. Also, resident "wants" may be added.

3. Service Plan or Agreement - a signed agreement between the Assisted Living Provider and the Resident (or their representative) identifying the services to be provided to meet both resident needs and wants. These services will customized for the resident, and will provided at a stated time and frequency (daily or weekly or...). Finally, the cost of these services will be itemized (or combined into a monthly package).

4. The Service Plan is supervised on some schedule, based on agency policies, or state licensing requirements. In many states where services may involve delegated nursing, the services are supervised more frequently the services that are not delegated. The most common nursing delegated service is medication administration. The purpose of the regular plan supervision is to determine if the current plan is meeting the resident's needs and preferences. If there is a change in condition, a new assessment and service plan may be negotiated.

5. Re-Assessment. The may start the process anew. Most states require an annual physician review that most providers precede by a nursing assessment which accompanies the resident. In this way, the physician and Care Manager are coordinating services.

PALs supports the above process in the following ways.

1. Assessment templates are provided for Care Managers that can be edited to fit their preferences, program specialties, and state requirements.

2 & 3. Service Planning is supported by selecting services from approved services based on licensure then customizing the service for the individual resident based on the resident assessment and “wants”. These services are assigned to a shift and scheduled for a specific time and day(s). This same information is used to create a Resident Agreement to be signed, shift assignment sheets, service documentation forms, and invoices.

4. Based on the services provided, if they are Nurse Delegated or not, and state licensing requirements, PALs will compute the date for the next plan supervision. PALs also provides a plan supervision form, for the nurse to document their finding regarding the appropriateness of the plan to the residents current health care needs and preferences, staff competence in providing the service, and resident’s evaluation of the service provision. Also the service documentation forms may be reviewed noting any variations (added or cancelled services). Based on the date of this interview, the next plan supervision is computed. So the nurse may print an up-to-date plan supervision schedule at any time.

5. Finally, at the time of physician review, at least annually by regulations, the nurse is again prompted by PALs to complete a re-assessment prior to the physician visit and PALs will print a form summarizing the nurse's recommendations and current treatments and medications for physician review and signature. A list of upcoming required physician visits can be printed at any time.

The above process has proven effective in meeting state requirements as reflected in state surveys.

For more information, visit our website at www.PALsSoftware.com and consider downloading a trial version.

Vaccination Record

2009-11-12T09:04:00.004-06:00

PALs has updated its software to make Resident Medical Records easier to enter and access for the following components.

Diagnoses / Allergies / Medical Appointments and Changes / Vaccinations.

Print reports for any or all of the above for any date range entered.

PALs, the leader in Assisted Living Software, just keeps getting better with age!

Pennsylvania Assisted Living Forms

2009-11-12T08:56:00.004-06:00

PALs has added Pensylvania's Adult Residential Licensing forms to its library of assessments and forms.

Personal Care Home Assessment - 55 Pa.Code 2600.225
Personal Care Home Support Plan - 2600.227
Resident Medical Evaluation - 55 Pa.Code 2600.141

Please contact our office for copies of these forms, or better yet, visit our website and download our FREE Trial.

PALs, the leader in Assisted Living Software, just keeps getting better with age!

Building Manager

2009-11-12T08:41:00.004-06:00

PALs has updated it's building manager program to make it more user friendly.

The building manager is a program to create Work Orders related to apartments or other assets (like equipment or buildings).

These Work Orders are assigned to a shift (generally maintenance or housekeeping) for either a specific time and date or repeating. In the latter case, a task can be entered once and repeated on either a weekly, monthly, or ___ (enter Number) of days to repeat-cyle.

A task list is printed for a specific date or range of dates, for staff to complete. Completed tasks are checked off, and any monetary charges recorded and staff time documented.

For Example. If a resident calls down with a request to fix a leaky faucet, a one-time Work Order is completed and entered into the system.

If the North Stairway needs to be swept and mopped every Wednesday, that is entered into the system to repeat on every Wednesday.

If Furnace filters need to be replaced every 6 months, that is entered to repeat every 180 days (30x6).

Print Work Orders daily, and each of the above will print on the correct date.

PALs, the leader in Assisted Living Software, just keeps getting better with age!

iPhone and PALs

2009-11-12T08:35:00.003-06:00

I just bought an iPhone, and let me tell you, the entire experience was a joy.

First of all, the sales staff were delightful, informed and loved their product. It was infectious. They took the time orient me about the phone, then I was off on an adventure. And soon downloaded my first app from the app store.

And here is where I want to link the iPhone to PALs. I wanted to be able to access PALs from my iPhone. No problem, "there is an app for that". I downloaded iTap RDP, and in no time at all, I was using PALs on my new iPhone. FANTASTIC!

I know other smart phones can do this also, if running windows mobile v5 or higher. But my experience with the iPhone was just too good not to share.

PALs, the leader in Assisted Living Software, just keeps getting better with age!

Staff Alerts

2009-08-15T10:20:00.005-06:00

PALs monitors a number of items to ensure regulatory compliance related to Nursing/Clinical regulations - See Nursing Alerts below. PALs has now expanded its "alerts" to monitor regulatory compliance for staff.

We have always monitored training hours, but now that has been expanded to monitor and issue "Alerts" if any of the following are out of compliance or nearing due dates:

1. Annual Training Hours
2. TB or TST (Tuberculin skin tests) due
3. Certification for Aides, or License for nursing staff
4. CPR certification due
5. Work Status (work permit or passport) expiration dates
6. Flu shots

PALs is committed to partnering with Assisted Living Communities in providing Resident Focused, Quality Care that is both regulatory compliant and profitable.

Nursing Alerts

2009-03-10T11:39:00.003-06:00

PALs Software has added Nursing Alerts to it's assisted living software.

PALs has always printed reports to remind nurses of actions that need to be taken that relate to clinical care or regulatory compliance, but with this new feature, nurses are automatically notified when they log on to PALs.

The Nursing Alerts include:

1. Medication Compliance
2. Medication Ordering
3. Physician Orders Due
4. Nursing Assessment & Care Plan reviews
5. Resident Annual MD Visit and Orders
6. Resident Health Insurance Expirations
7. Staff Training Hours related to requirements
8. Staff TB Testing Due

PALs Software is in its 10th year of operation, and continues to meet the needs of assisted living providers to remain compliant with regulations and provide quality care while remaining profitable.

Audit Tool Added

2009-02-10T09:33:00.002-06:00

PALs has recently added an Audit Tool. This enhancement not only tracks who has access to Personal Health Information (PHI), but limits their access according to user-group, and also documents changes to records, noting both previous and changed data.

For Example, Aides may be restricting to only viewing certain information; while nurses may view and enter new records, change existing records, or delete records.

The audit tool will "TRACK" when an aide logs-in capturing their name, id, date and time; and what action they took (printed shift assignment sheet), and when they log-out.

If a nurse logs-in and changes a record, an audit trail will identify who the nurse is, the date and time of the record change, and the previous and changed values of the changed record. So if a medication is changed from ASA 250mg to ASA 500mg, both these values as captured along with the date and time and name of the person making the change.

PALs continues to build on user requests and changes in the regulatory environment.

Documentation Choices

2009-01-29T10:55:00.005-06:00

In PALs, you can document Medications and/or Services (1) on the computer - Real Time; (2) on Paper or (3) a combination - Documentation by Exception.

(1) PALs can be setup for computer entry of Meds or Services using a mouse or touch-screen for an input device. This approach is the most costly and complex, and often, most time consuming because of the complexity, required training, and number of staff using the system.

But it is very accurate. Every service and meds is documented in real-time. If you need to know if that Med or Service was provided at 10:30 am and not at 10:45 am and you need to know it real-time, this is the approach for you. An eMAR or eSAR will print automatically.

(2) The paper form, default, will simply require to staff initial on a monthly MAR or SAR. The is the most simple and least costly approach. Supervisory staff would need to review each resident's MAR or SAR to see variations and missing services.

(3) The Combination approach, Documentation by Exception, combines the above two. Staff print a Shift Assignment sheet for both Meds and Services. During the printing process, all meds and services are automatically entered into the computer as "provided" by the staff person who logged in. Then, maybe two or three times during their shift, staff chart by exception, noting services or meds NOT GIVEN. Using this method, supervisory staff know what services were missed and eMARs and eSARs print automatically, along with variation reports.

This latter approach combines the eMAR and eSAR of #1, without the need for additional computers, input devices, or setup and maintenance of a wireless network.

With PALs you have choices.

Staff Work Schedules and Time Records

2008-10-07T12:02:00.003-06:00

PALs will easily create staff schedules and allow previous week schedules to be duplicated or advanced by simply changing the begin_on date. This works well when schedules rotate on a regular basis. Now you simply make edits to reflect any changes, such as requested time off. Staff_Schedule

PALs will also post this schedule to a new table to keep tract of the hours that employees actually work. So, again, we edit by exception. When someone does not work the hours they were scheduled, you simply edit to reflect the actual hours worked.

When a pay period ends, you print a report showing actual hours worked. This data may also be exported to Excel. Staff_TimeRecord

Because we have both the work schedule, showing who was expected to be working, and we have the actual hours or who did work, we can print a report to show "Staff Who Missed Shifts" or "Staff Who Worked Extra". These reports will post to staff notes, so that at time of staff review, the data is available.

PALs is constantly improving to make operating an assisted living communty easy, efficient, and profitable. Please download a free trial from www.PALsSoftware.com .

Assisted Living Manager's Assessment

2008-06-22T14:00:00.007-06:00

Maryland's "Assisted Living Manager's Assessment" or "ALM Assessment" has been added to PALs library of assessments.

Because PALs offers a unique User-Defined Assessment component, entering any assessment is a simple process. The process has again been enhanced to include entering your own assessment "choices" and selecting from those choices with just the click of a button. This makes doing assessment quick and easy. You can also elect to duplicate a past assessment, then just update changes.

If your state's assessment is not in our library, we will gladly add it. Assessments can be easily converted to professional care-plans by following our model of: Domain, Focus, Assessment, Approach and Outcome.

For more information go to http://www.palssoftware.com/ and download a free trial of PALs Executive or call toll free: 877-724-7257 for more information.

PALs Medication Manager Links to Vigilan Software

2008-05-27T15:29:00.003-06:00

Another opportunity has come our way!

Vigilan software users can now link to PALs Medication Manager. This way, Vigilan users do not have to re-enter resident data and they can utilize PALs Medication Manager and print MARs and other reports.

To get started, all they need to do is visit our website and download the Medication Manager program and call for an activation code. AND like all our users, they can try it free for 7 days prior to purchasing.

MAR More Enhancements

2008-05-25T06:59:00.005-06:00

PALs Medication Manager has been enhanced to include not only the MAR, Medication Administration Record, but now you can use this same format to enter and document services or monitor meals.

For example, instead of entering Meds, simply enter a service like, AM Cares or Bath or PM Cares, as a med name and create a documentation record like the one shown HERE.

Or enter meals, breakfast - lunch - supper, as a "med" and create a meal monitoring report like the one shown HERE.

Thanks to suggestions from our users, PALs Assisted Living Software just keeps getting better! For more information, visit our website at http://www.palssoftware.com/

MAR - Medication Administration Record - Enhancements

2008-05-05T08:34:00.002-06:00

After recently releasing an updated version of our popular MAR for Assisted Living Communities, it came under increased scrutiny resulting in the following enhancements.

ORDER Meds - you can now "order" meds on the MAR so they don't just show in the order they are entered. Meds are separated into two groupings: Scheduled and PRN Meds. Now within each of these grouping, you can determine the order in which meds appear.

REPEAT Med Every ___ Days. This scheduling option was not previously supported. Instead, you could enter either "Odd" or "Even" days. But users quickly pointed out that this is a problem when a month has 31 days, as then two "Odd" days come together. So now when you want to schedule a medication for "Odd" days, you simply start it on an "Odd" day and repeat it every 2 days. This has the added advantage of scheduling every 7 days (weekly), or 30 days (monthly) or every 180 days (6 months).

So PALs Software continues to evolve thanks to our loyal users who provide valuable feedback.

For more information on PALs Software for Assisted Living Communities, please visit our website at: www.PALsSoftware.com

PALs Support for a Service Business

2008-04-28T07:39:00.002-06:00

In the April 2008 edition of the Harvard Business Review is an article titled, "The Four Things a Service Business Must Get Right". After reading this article, I thought how does PALs Software support this model? No question, Assisted Living Providers are in the service Business.

The author, Frances X. Frei, says the success or failure of a service business comes down to getting four things right or wrong. 1. The Offering, 2. The Funding Mechanism, 3. The Employee Management System and 4. The Customer Management System. So how does PALs support these four?

1. The Offering - service attributes (caring, competence), and these attributes match up with customers' priorities.

PALs software will enable you to create QI projects to look at resident/family satisfaction with the staff caring and competence as well as assessing what the resident's priorities are.

2. The Funding Mechanism - are customers paying as palatably as possible.

PALs supports both package, all inclusive pricing, and ala carte pricing. And PALs automatically compares services delivered to services agreed to in the resident's admission agreement. Thus, all residents are assured of getting the services they are being paying for.

3. The Employee Management System - what makes employees both reasonable ABLE and MOTIVATED to produce excellence?

PALs will help staff in being able to provide excellence by giving them a list of shift assignments with times that need to be done during their shift. These assignments are created from the aggregation of all resident service agreements. So staff know what is expected of them and when it is expected. How to motivate staff, is in part, supported by PALs calculation of Shift Productivity (see related blog below). By taking into effect Shift Productivity (hours of service time/total shift time) when developing the staff work schedule, all staff are ensured of working equally hard; or having the same ratio of service minutes to hours worked. This eliminates staff morale issues related to some shifts feeling "over-worked".

Another way that PALs might support staff motivation is to develop another QI project looking at resident satisfaction with staff performance. The highest ranked staff would be given special rewards, and the lowest ranked would be given additional coaching (to improve or terminate!).

4. The Customer Management System - what is the customer's job assignment? The author examines the banking and airlines for how they develop roles, or jobs, for their customers.

In the assisted living industry, for competent residents, they can be responsible to "direct" their own care. For non-competent residents, responsible parties need to be involved in directing the resident's cares.

PALs supports residents to direct their own care, by involving them in the assessment process, monitoring and evaluating services provided, and reviewing with a nurse on a regular basis their current care needs and related services. PALs will provide the data - current services provided and minutes or care, computer aided assessments and care plans, plan review dates, and detailed monthly statements showing dates and times and minutes of care. All PALs data can be shared with residents to ensure transparency and integrity.

The author summarizes by asking if all decisions you make in one dimension are supported by those you've made in another.

This is the strength of computer systems in general, and PALs in particular, changes made in one area, automatically cascade down to all related areas. So whether you change a resident's service plan, or employees staffing hours, everything is kept in balance.

For more information on PALs Assisted Living Software, please visit our website at www.PALsSoftware.com

PALs - The Paper Flow

2008-03-27T08:41:00.004-06:00

Although PALs can be setup for electronic entry, most users setup PALs using the paper mode.

In this setup, operationally, only three reports are regularly needed:
1. Shift Assignment Sheet - one report per shift per week or day (depending on the size of the community;
2. SAR - Service Administration Record - one per resident per month; and
3. MAR - Medication Administration Record - one per resident per month.

Shift Assignment Sheet - This report lists all the services from all the residents service agreements, in time order, that need to be performed during the shift. For smaller communities, with few service changes, each shift assignment may be printed for seven days, placed in a sheet protector and re-used and reprinted for the days effected by changes in a resident's service plan. For larger communities, with daily changes in resident services, a shift assignment sheet should be printed for each shift, every day.

SAR - This is a record of services provided and looks like a MAR. One page per resident per month. Using the Shift Assignment Sheet for notes, staff document on the SAR prior to ending their shift. This form may also be used by the nurse to orient staff to the resident's plan of care.

MAR - This record is used to document medications administered or observed. Again, one page per resident per month. This report is usually stored with the medications and staff initial to document medications administered.

Operationally, using PALs in the paper mode, requires very little paper flow.

Please visit our website at http://www.palssoftware.com/ and download a free trial of PALs Executive and experience it for yourself.

Organizational Integrity in Assisted Living Communities

2008-03-24T07:09:00.002-06:00

Organization Integrity, simply stated means, doing what you say you will do.

It begins when you develop a service agreement with a resident. In this agreement, you state what services you will provide, personalized for the individual resident, when you will provide them, for how long, and the price. If you "package price" for a group of services, these services should be unbundled and personalized for the resident.

So a bath on Wednesday night at 8pm will be included in the service agreement, along with all the other services a resident will receive and be expected to pay for.

PALs Software will automatically add this service to the "shift assignment sheet" for the pm shift on Wednesday. Before the staff person performing the pm shift leaves work, they will document that they provided the service (or if not, why not) on another form that looks like a MAR but for services.

At the end of the month, all services are automatically billed, along with any ala carte services. If the resident or family question any item billed, an audit trail is available.

PALs - Professional Assisted Living Software will:

1. Print the Service Agreement
2. Automatically include all service agreement tasks on the shift assignment sheet so someone is accountable for providing the service.
3. Print the Service Documentation form to document the provision of service.
4. Automatically create an invoice to bill for services provided, packaged, individual, or ala carte.

All the above promotes "Organizational Integrity" meaning you do what you say you will do, which in turn, builds your organization's "brand".

To download a free trial of PALs go to www.PALsSoftware.com

Staff Scheduling in Assisted Living Communities

2008-03-21T08:38:00.004-06:00

How Assisted Living Communities develop staff work schedules, impacts both Staff and Resident Satisfaction and PROFITS. Integral to this discussion, is an understanding of "Shift Productivity".

Shift Productivity is the ratio of Service Hours to Work Hours. For example, if staff work an 8 hours shift, during which time they provide 6 hours of direct resident service, 6/8= 75% shift productivity.

If Shift Productivity was 100%, staff would be exhausted, residents may not get there service on time since one resident taking more time would throw off all the other services. Residents would feel as though staff was not available and therefore not interested in their welfare.

Shift Productivity also effected profits. If it is set too low, say 50% or only providing 4 hours of service for each 8 hour shift, would staff costs would double, and compared to your competition, possible price you out of the market.

PALs suggests pricing services based on 15 minutes of staff time. To figure your staff cost calculate your "fully loaded" hourly rate x 1+(100-shift productivity). So if your hourly rate for an aide is $16 and your shift productivity is 75% then your price per 15 minutes of staff time is, 16/4 x 1+(1.00-.75) = $5.00 per 15 minutes. Add on Overhead and Return-On-Investment (30%) and staffing become a revenue center when you charge (5 x 1.30) or $6.50 per 15 minutes. And all your staff time is paid if you take into consideration Shift Productivity when developing the staff work schedule.

Another advantage of using this Shift Productivity ratio is that it eliminates "Service Creep". If you define service creep as unpaid service, if all your staff time is "paid for", service creep becomes a service opportunity not a problem to be eliminated.

This Shift Productivity ratio also equalizes shifts, so one shift is not seen as providing more service than another. And staff are provided an incentive to report all additional services, otherwise they may be working harder than another shift.

In summary, when scheduling staff and pricing services, you need to factor in Shift Productivity. PALs will do the calculations for you and monitor compliance.

For related information see "7 Steps to Profits" below.

To download a free trial of PALs, just visit our website at http://www.palssoftware.com/

MAR Form for Assisted Living Communities

2008-03-09T09:20:00.005-06:00

PALs offers seven MAR formats,and now we've added an eighth in response to user's request.

In the past week two users requested a MAR that would be used when meds are ordered for specific days; e.g. Mon/Wed/Fri, or Odd or Even days of the Month. We were happy to oblige and the new form is called, MAR_Daily and can be seen clicking here (note order stating Odd or Even days).

PALs, the most feature rich Assisted Living Software, now offers one more feature for its users. For more information on PALs, please visit our website at http://www.palssoftware.com/

MAR - Medication Administration Record

2008-02-24T10:23:00.008-06:00

PALs Assisted Living Software is pleased to offer the Medication Manager. This program sells for only $250.

Enter medications once and print MARs, Physician Orders, and Pharmacy re-order reports. Other reports include Medication Setup (when using a dosage box system), Medication Profiles, and a variety of Medication lists as well as a resident roster.

To download a free trial or for more information please visit our website at: http://www.palssoftware.com/

Can Software Help to Increase Profits?

2008-02-20T13:31:00.005-06:00

Absolutely. But it is how they assist that makes all the difference. As a rule, there are two approaches:

1. Track all services (minutes) provided and bill for it. Revenue side focus.
2. Provide management with the tools they need to manage Profits = Revenue - Costs

Option 1 is doable in most software today by simply adding an "ala carte" or one-time service for billing purposes. The downside of this approach is that is does not control your costs, staff hours, and may result in compromised customer satisfaction. Residents feel that staff/management only see them as dollar signs!

Option 2 focuses on relating service pricing and staffing hours so that all staffing hours are paid for, thus controlling costs, and any increase in revenue goes straight to the bottom line.

PALs will support your efforts in either approach. See "7 Step to Profits" (below), for further discussion of option2.

What PALs offers, and most others don't, is the ability to enter your staff work schedule and compute the "Shift Productivity Ratio" (service hours per shift/staffing hours per shift). By using this Ratio in both pricing and developing staff work schedules, all staffing hours will be paid-for. Since additional services would represent additional revenue, staff are really profit-centers, NOT cost-centers.

With the management tools provided by PALs, incentives are aligned: Staff do not feel overworked, management has no incentive to understaff, and most importantly, residents feel valued as individuals and not as dollar signs.

For more information please visit our website at: www.PALsSoftware.com

Customer Service

2008-01-31T08:58:00.001-06:00

I had a nurse call yesterday to say she was delighted to find that PALs has a Standing Orders feature that eliminates having to enter the same medication into all residents medication list. But...

She wanted to control the number of lines for documenting on the related MAR. So if a standing order was limited to one time daily, only one line would print and if a medication could be given every 2 hours up to six times daily, six lines would print on the MAR.

After a little discussion and clarification, we agreed to make the changes and had an update to her within four hours of the request.

So now PALs has an enhanced feature, thanks to our customer, that is available for you to download from our website at http://www.palssoftware.com/
when you download our PALs Executive program - the Standard in Assisted Living Software.

Lead Manager for Assisted Living Communities

2008-01-02T10:54:00.001-06:00

PALs is pleased to offer it's Lead Managers program FREE to Assisted Living Communities that download PALs Executive - Assisted Living software.

PALs Lead Management software offers the following features:

1. Track leads through a user-defined phases (pipeline). 1 Inquiry -> 2 Tour -> 3 Negotiation -> 4 Move-In and report both numbers in the "pipeline" and ratio's of Leads to Tours / Negotiation / Move-In.

2. Add marketing dollars and print report to show cost per lead.

3. Assign each lead to a "Lead Manager" and document each contact and optionally set a "To Do" date for follow up.

4. Each day the Lead Manager reviews their "To Do" list and takes approproate action.

5. Quickly and easily print form letters or send emails or merge to WORD Documents.

6. And when your lead Move's In, data is automatically sent to PALs Assisted Living Software.

7. PALs Lead Manager can be used for contacts other than "Leads" to serve as your general "contact manager".

8. Includes 25+ reports including mailing labels.

Happy New Year - and please download your lead manager from our website at: http://www.palssoftware.com/

7 steps to Profits

2007-12-09T11:37:00.004-06:00

Seven Steps to Assisted Living PROFITS with PALs

PALs will guide you to guaranteed PROFITS by giving you the tools to ensure that: "Revenue is greater than Costs".

The common denominator between service revenue and service costs is minutes. By converting both revenue and costs into minutes, PALs will guide you to profits. The examples will use "Per 15 minutes" but you could as well use per 10 or 5 or 1 minute.

PALs will calculate all the following:

1. Revenue = charges "Per 15 minutes" of service (see below) X total "15 minutes" for all Resident Services

2. Charges "Per 15 minutes" = Wages & benefits "Per 15 minutes" X Shift Productivity (defined below) X Overhead & ROI. This formula ensures that ALL of your staff time is "paid for" plus a profit margin. This mitigates "service creep" and converts staff from a cost center to a profit center since both Overhead & ROI are included.

3. Shift Productivity - is the ratio of all Resident Service Minutes divided by Shift minutes. Six hours of Resident Services during an 8 hour shift yields (6/8=0.75) = 75% Shift Productivity ratio.

4. Staff Cost "Per 15 minutes" = Staff wages & benefits "Per 15 minutes" X Shift Hours (converted to 15 minutes units)

5. PROFIT = Revenue – Staff Costs or Service Profit = (Pricing X service minutes) - Staff Costs

PALs will perform all the above calculations for you. Remember, the final number must be marketable (or offer a competitive advantage) in your service area.

Given the goal is to keep Revenue greater than Costs, PROFITS are GUARANTEED if you follow these 7 steps when using PALs.

1. Calculate your "Per 15 minutes" charges using PALs Template

Use the "Per 15 minute Charge" section to determine your charges for "Per 15 minutes" of service. See footnotes. By adding in the Overhead and ROI, each staff person becomes a revenue generator, as opposed to a cost center.

Determine what your agency's "Shift Productivity" will be by policy. Be sure to follow this policy when scheduling staff in step 7 below.

2. Price Services and charge by "Per 15 minutes" as calculated above. Enter services and charges based on the charge "per 15 minutes" as calculated above. When complete, click on "Print" button and review your Service Assessment template. You will use this to gather data to enter into the next two steps. Hint, enter services based on "encounter" rather than ADL. For example, AM_Care is the service (encounter) and it may include (multiple ADLs) dressing, grooming, toileting… depending on the resident.

3. Assess Resident's need for above services.

PALs will create a service template that will be applied to each resident in the form of an assessment. You only create this once. Then edit and use if for all residents. When administrating this assessment, remember you are only assessing for minutes of care. You do not have to enter the service need, only the minutes. You will enter the service description when developing the Resident Service Agreement in the next step.

It is recommended that this Assessment be done prior to admission, then 14 days after admission using the Service Documentation sheet from step 6 below as your data source. Your "Resident Service Agreement" should also state that service charges are reviewed regularly and will be adjusted as defined by your "Levels of Care".

4. Enter Resident Services using the Services from 2 and 3 Above
Enter resident services and assign each service to a specific shift, at a specific time and enter the number of minutes from the Resident Assessment (step 3). On the "Service Description" tab, describe how this service should be customized for this resident.

5. Shift Assignment Sheet/Checklist

Print the staff schedule daily to capture changes in services. Using this "checklist" will ensure that all services promised in the Resident's Service Agreement, are provided and billed as scheduled or any variation is documented.

6. Service Documentation - Staff Charting

Now have staff document services using the monthly "With Minutes/Variation" form. Use this documentation to trigger a re-assessment. Consistent variations may indicate a "Change in Condition" and warrant a different "Level of Care".

7. Staff Work Schedule – Schedule and check the "Shift Productivity" ratio

Enter the staff work schedule and click on the "Review Shift Productivity" button to ensure that service hours divided by Shift Hours is equals to or greater than the Shift Productivity ratio used when figuring costs "per 15 minutes" in step 1 above.

Bonus - No UN-controlled Service Creep. All staff hours are "paid for" since the charge "per 15 minutes" includes the Shift Productivity factor. Additional services or added time to current services present an opportunity not only for additional revenue, but more importantly, additional PROFITS!

Also, the incentives are aligned between management and staff. Staff is given an incentive to report additional services or work harder (more minutes) than another shift that reports all additional service time. And management is given an incentive to make sure sufficient staff are working since they are now revenue generators and revenue finders and contributing to both overhead and ROI.

Summary: With the above management tools, You can now manage for PROFITS!!

To download a trial copy of PALs go to http://www.palssoftware.com/

Assisted Living Software - Quality and Systems

2006-12-31T10:40:00.001-06:00

Peter Drucker, the famous management guru, defined quality as simply a "reduction in variation". If there is a "right way" to do things, then the variation around this "right way" needs to be minimized. If there is no "right way", then your organization adds no value!

By carefully defining your "value added" as the "right way" and transmitting this to your employees, you create a "competitive advantage".

In addition to defining this "right way" in your Policies and Procedures" and otherwise transmitting this to your employees, I suggest that software is another tool or system to use in improving the quality of your organization.

Consider the following example. You decide that your organization will distinguish itself by doing what it says it will do, on time, and meet or exceed resident expectations in the process.

Your software should print a resident Service Agreement, to specify what services will be provided, when (time), by whom (shift) and how long (in minutes). This Agreement is signed by both parties.

Now when staff come to work, their "shift assignment sheet" is printed to remind staff of promises made to residents. After the service is completed, the resident may be asked to initial and evaluate the service.

These same services are printed on a Resident specific documentation form, which is initialed by the staff person and used to verify that services were provided. The final step, is to print an invoice that reflects the services provided (including any additional services).

The above process is facilitated by having systems in place, a software program, that, once the services are entered, will automatically generate the Resident Service Agreement, Shift Assignment sheet, Service Documentation form, and monthly invoice.