A Look into the Aging Care Industry

By Gary Marsh, Masonic Homes Kentucky President & CEO

I recently had the opportunity to participate in Louisville Business First’s Aging Care Roundtable providing the community with insight into the fast-growing, aging care industry. The discussion brought up some great information and I encourage you to read more from Business First.

As we age many of us look for ways to remain healthy. At Masonic Homes Kentucky and other it is important that the programming that we do for residents is very diverse and more health-oriented. It’s nothing to see people doing tai chi and yoga and water aerobics and on and on and on. When we first opened Miralea, a resident stopped me in the lobby and she said, “You’re wearing me out,” and I said, “What’s wrong?” She said, “Well, I’ve never been this active, and I’m just getting so tired because I try to be involved in everything you do.” And I said, “Well, that’s a good thing, you know, and maybe eventually you’ll figure out which ones are better for you and which ones aren’t,” but I don’t know that you can do too much for them, to be honest. I think my generation is more interested in figuring out ways to live a longer life.

Photo by Business First

We are fortunate to provide a continuum of care at Masonic so we have a lot of diversity in the different programming that we have for seniors. For those who are interested in securing their future and knowing what’s going to happen, they can enter the Life Care contract with us and we guarantee that in the event that they need more than independent living we guarantee them the price that they’re going to pay. It’s a way of guaranteeing where they’re going to be when they have the need at the same price that they had when they were still independent.

We use technology across the board to improve the quality of life for our residents. We have a product called Breezie that our independent living residents use. They all have their own tablet that has basically all the communications that they need, including their access to social media, right there. They know what’s going on in the dining room. They know what’s going on in the activities. They know what’s going on in the campus. They know what’s going on in the world. We keep looking for things that will assist us in providing a more diverse and better lifestyle for the residents we serve.

We are involved with the Innovators Alliance and one of the things that we’re going to be doing is seeking out start-up technology and trying to engage them in knowing how their technology is going to be applicable to the aging adults that we serve. We want to give them guidance to make them more successful because the more success we provide in that arena with the people who are intelligent about technology, the better off we’re going to be.

Read more from Louisville Business First’s Aging Roundtable to get a better look into the aging care industry. It may help you understand and better navigate aging care options when you need to look for a loved one or yourself.