Intelycare: The Uber of Nursing Home Staffing

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It's both sides of the equation. It's helping nursing homes. Nursing homes. It's the most

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at need facility that needs a staffing. Like we talked about, hospitals don't have

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aside situation. That's kind of what we build our platform off of.

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I hate to say that we're the uber of, but in the on demand economy,

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it's instant gratification to say I have a shift coming up right

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now not able to redo.

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Welcome to the nursing home podcast. Your goto

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source for professional insights in the longterm care industry.

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Hear from leaders and experts as they share current and practical insights

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to help make the most of your day. I'm the longterm care financial specialist.

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What that means is I help people plan for the inevitable.

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Nobody wants to think about getting old, but it's possible that someday we might need

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a little bit of care. Here's your host. Nursing home Administrator

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Turnpodcaster Schmoel,

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Septimashptimash.

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Welcome to this episode of the nursing home podcast.

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We're really excited to bring you another episode of the

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show. My guest today is Chris Coldfield.

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Chris has a very innovative software solution

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to a very painful nursing home problem.

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And Chris, first of all, welcome to the show. And please, just before

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we even jump into the solution, tell us a little bit about who you are

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personally, just to give us an idea of who we're

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talking to and professionally how you kind of evolved to where

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you are right now in your business. Sure. First, thanks for having me.

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So I've been a nurse for about ten years. I've worked in a couple of

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different settings long term care, nursing informatics, home health. I also been

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a nursing union representative, so I was working about

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five years ago in the labor world and also in nursing

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informatics. We were having a lot of issues at our facility with

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covering shifts that were short notice. So all of my fellow

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colleagues were being mandated to stay 16 hours. We weren't

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having just gaps in our holes being filled. And we went

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to the administrators. There were some great people. We asked them,

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what type of solutions can we use agencies? But there was really no agency solution

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out there or kind of solution to fill in short periods

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of time when we really need staff. We just didn't have it. So we started

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in telecare. I actually formed it with the director of it at that hospital long

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term q care facility. We've been going at it for about four years now,

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and we specifically focus on nursing homes. Okay, well, so basically

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you've lived and breathed the problem. You understand what it's

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like to be mandated to stay an extra shift, and even though it's not

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legal, but sometimes there are nurses that end up saying three shifts.

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How they physically do that, I have no idea. I do know probably

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they must leave somewhere in the middle. It's not good for patient care, let's just

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say that. But it happens not good for patient care. It's not good for staff

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care. Of course it's not good for patient care. It's not good for anybody.

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It does not make any sense. Nobody could work 24 hours straight. Yeah,

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some of us struggle to get through the regular nine to five and

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working 16 hours as nurses are sometimes used to. So let's

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talk about the problem before we talk about your specific solution. I can tell you

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from my experience as a nursing home administrator that there are

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many times filling the nursing shifts is a challenge because the rates

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that we pay in the nursing home is significantly less. The nurse will

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get paid in other settings. The work is significantly

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more labor intensive and with limited resources.

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So it's difficult to get nurses to work in a nursing home to

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begin with. So let's start from that angle. Again, talking to your nursing

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background, what type of nurses are actually more

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prone to choose a nursing home setting versus hospital setting? I'll just tell you.

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My son was born around a year and a half ago. We ended up in

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the NICU for a week or two, and I was an

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active nursing home administrator. And I come in there, and there's one nurse

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that's dealing with one or maybe two babies for the entire shift

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and for a lot of that shift, and again, the babies in the NICU.

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But it was a slight breathing issue. It was checking oxygen

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levels and just changing a diaper. It was, like,

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so quiet and calm and just the exact opposite of what

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I'm used to. And from what I intend to pay is that much higher.

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Why would someone choose a nursing home over such a setting? And then let's figure

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out why there's a problem. Sure. I mean, in my experience in nursing homes

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all over the country, I primarily see a high concentration of

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LPNs. Being the staff nurses at nursing homes, I've actually seen

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in Massachusetts, there's actually more RNS working than other parts of the country,

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but primarily it's somebody that has gone out of school,

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they got their first job, and they actually really like to work in nursing homes.

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They like dealing with geriatric care patients as well as certified nursing

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assistants. Our big pool is actually a big bulk of nursing assistance,

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and it's about 33% that we staff for LPNs

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and RNS. So it's somebody looking for consistency, somebody that likes geriatric

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care. And some do take jumps and move into the IC level care,

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which it's much different working with one patient compared to 20

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in the daytime and 40 at nighttime, but you usually have to

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love it. Now, I don't want to jump into it, but in our pool of

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nurses, we do have a vast different amount of types of nurses.

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We do have hostile nurses that pick up shifts at nursing homes. We do

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occasionally have the ICU nurse pick it up, but they usually don't like to jump

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away from their one patient. But there's a big, vast amount of

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nurses that will work in long term care if it's picking up a shift here

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and they're covering getting some extra money. But as far as committing

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in a full time spectrum, 40 hours per week, a lot of nurses get burned

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out in the nursing home setting because the amount of Acuity that they're dealing with

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in the rehab floor, just the amount of patients that they're dealing with in the

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general typical floor. Got it. Again. So the nursing home industry is

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specifically from a nursing staffing standpoint, so it's definitely a very

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significant struggle right. To staff them. And so you're right

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that the LPNs, and there are those who prefer the geriatric

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population over, let's say the ICU, even though it might

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be commerce on some level, but at the same time, there's still

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a tremendous shortage. So that means that if you just add up, if you do

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the math between the open shifts, let's say in Massachusetts,

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and the number of available nurses, it can't add

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up, then there's a shortage. There are more open shifts

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available than LPM segorio which is why every nursing

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home is struggling. Absolutely. Is that correct first? Yeah. What adds

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to that too, is if you take, for example, a hospital

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setting where they have 30 units in a full management staff,

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that's there they're able to flex different nurses based off of call

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outs. So they're able to better accommodate their shortages,

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severe shortages than a nursing home where there might be two units there in

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the nighttime. Nurse is the supervisor, so there's not much room to wiggle.

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Sometimes you have the DN kind of come in, which makes them kind of really

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stressed out because they're already working a lot. But there's even more of a shortage

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in the nursing home just because the logistics within that nursing home

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is not as set up as a hospital to float to multiple different units in

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the amount of nurses they have in their pools. So it's twice as bad just

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for the small sitting that you're working with and the opportunities that you have.

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Okay, so that's definitely true. Each organization definitely much smaller.

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Yup. And therefore you don't have the ability to just

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say, oh, you were supposed to work on Friday. How about you working on Tuesday?

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And by Friday we'll figure it out. Although we do that sometimes in the nursery

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I'm sending as well. We certainly don't have the same luxury like you're pointing out

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as in the hospital setting. I think at the end of the day, there's more

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nurses that are needed than nurses that are available.

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Absolutely. So someone's always going to either be short staffed or working

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too many hours in a row the way that it shouldn't be. So your company

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is Intelli care, right? Am I saying it right? That's correct.

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Intelli Care. Okay. I was calling Intelli Care, but I see. It's called Intelli Care,

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I guess. Intelligent way of Caring for residents. I assume that's

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the name. Yeah, that's what we came from. Yeah. All right, awesome. So tell

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us what the system is and how does it address this problem?

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Yeah, so, I mean, we focus on the short need kind

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of one shift off care. So nursing homes,

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when they typically work with staffing agencies, staffing agencies, they love

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to get these big blocked book assignments, and that's what they're really good

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at doing because it's easier to get a nurse to kind of commit than

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to call up a bunch of different nurses and say, can you work this shift?

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And a shift is coming up in 6 hours. That's kind of what we build

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our platform off of. I hate to say that we're the Uber of, but it's

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in the on demand economy. It's instant gratification to say, I have

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a shift coming up right now and I'm able to work, and that's what we

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do. So we've been doing that since we started the company.

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We've been continuously adding to that product of not

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just filling last minute shifts. That's what we're good at, that other people can't necessarily

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do. Of course, we've built on some consistency levels of reprioritizing

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the same nurses that you rank high to keep coming back. And we've added

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the block booking as well because the sniff standpoint, you still want an agency

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and the same person coming back. So we've definitely added that. But our subject or

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topic that we're really trying to address is somebody calls out

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or I don't have somebody on Sunday, and how do we get one nurse to

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fill that spot rather than having to have this long commitment?

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Because your census is fluctuating based on your rehab settings

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and also your call outs and your negotiations of, I'll work

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today a double, but if I take off Saturday and I've done that in a

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bunch of different times, then all of a sudden the facilities, what do I do

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on Saturday? So that's what we are. We have a lot of our clients massachusetts,

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a lot of our clients put in their shifts on Wednesday for the weekend.

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A lot of them come in the day before. A lot of them come in

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that day. And that's what we do. We fill just

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intermittent shifts. And if you want to go beyond that, of course we can offer

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that solution. But it's a lot of flexible nurses that are just looking for part

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time work that don't necessarily want to do any more hours in their unit.

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They're just sick and burnt out of it. They want to have a different setting.

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And we take nurses from Med search units

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at Mass General and Brigham and women's. They also work for us as well,

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just picking up shifts the last minute. So that's our pain point that we address.

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So you don't want to call it Uber for staffing, but that is exactly what

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it is. Right? It's on demand, filling a shift. And just

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like Uber, I'm going to use that example because I think it's phenomenal.

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I mean, just like it has a certain built in transparency where riders

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can rate their drivers and drivers can rate their riders,

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and next time a certain driver comes and they have a low rating, you might

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cancel that ride and say no. And the same thing if a ride request comes

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in as a driver, you might say, I'm not interested in this person. So when

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the agency comes in, it's almost like the nursing home is desperate and the

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agency knows that, the nurse that picks up the shift knows that. So it

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doesn't matter what level of care she provides. Also, it's like a one

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off thing. So as long as she gets through the 8 hours, she's going to

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get paid regardless of what type of care she actually

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provides. And nursing home is kind of stuck with that because at the end of

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the day they need someone to take the shift. Yeah, exactly. We're adding the extra

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layer of transparency so every shift is rated, the shift is

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rated by the nurse that you're passing the assignment on them in the first hand.

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And also for the administrator, for the Don, for the schedule, also gets

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to go back and wait. They get the experience. They get the real word in

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the street of what happened in the shift. So all of those shifts that are

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rated one through three, I've listened to a previous podcast about

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repute I tickets created and that's followed up by our clinical team and also a

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professional team. If there's a bad experience, we're following up with that.

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We call them Intelli Pros, our clinical employees, seeing what the situation was. And we're

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also following back up with the Don, the scheduler, the unit

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manager, and addressing that because we need quality in the

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particular organization to actually continue to thrive. Facilities won't continue to

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request if we're sending bad quality individuals. When we do find the really good

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quality, they're reaching out. They're trying to prioritize them back and

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also block book them as well. So it's kind of a try before you want

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to commit to somebody for a longer period of time, but also fill

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when you really need to. Okay, interesting. So it's not just

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here's our platform like Uber and use it

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and knock yourself out and enjoy it. And if it doesn't work, too bad.

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Try Lyft or buy a car or whatever. You're really holding

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their hands through the process to make sure that it works. It's a little bit

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more complex than getting a ride. Obviously we're talking about care for

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frill geriatric patients. We're talking about fitting

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in dynamically with the staff that's already present, that already is

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somewhat hesitant to welcome in agency

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staff. And you're also solving another big problem. I don't know if this was done

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intentionally or not, I could say from a nursing home perspective, whenever we get desperate

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for staffing and we try to get our per diem list. So those are

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not familiar with the term. Our nurses that signed up, or any staff members signed

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up, where they're promising to pick up a certain minimum number

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of shifts on a monthly basis, let's say, and many times they don't keep

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to that minimum. Then we go through the whole list, and we say, we have

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the schedule of the business office manager called them up, say, if you don't pick

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up by this date, then we take you off the list. And then they'll pick

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up for a little bit until next time we get that we have time to

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call them again. And that doesn't work for either way, it doesn't work for us

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because unless we chase them down, for the most part, even though they get paid

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more than regular staffers, many times,

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they're still not going to call us unless we reach out to them proactively.

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And for them also, they're not going to get those shifts. They're not

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going to go and pick it up. But you're saying that they could be now

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nurses anywhere. And now if a nurse knows that, you know what, they spent a

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little bit extra money, they went out, you know, over the weekend and went above

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their budget, and now they want to, you know, want to balance checkbook.

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They go into their app, they look for a shift, they pick a nursing home

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in their area, and if there's something available that sounds good,

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they can jump on it. So was that done intentionally? Yes.

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As far as giving nurses more opportunities to work around

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their schedule, absolutely. It's both sides of the equation.

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It's helping nursing homes, nursing homes, it's the most at need facility that

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needs a staffing. Like we talked about, hospitals don't have as bad situation.

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So for nurses, if you've worked as a

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nurse and you've moved your way up to medical, surgical, and other type of units,

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a lot of times you've already worked as a nursing home nurse as well.

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So it's actually more relevant for the experience, nurses to also jump back

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and actually jump back into geriatric care. So there's so many

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different facilities out there. I know that you're in, I think, the hangham

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area and our clientele in that area, there might be ten facilities that we're

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servicing within somebody's driving distance in that area.

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So I have a lot of opportunities, a lot of different facilities I can work

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at. And the shifts, there's usually a lot of different shifts available.

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So for them, it's definitely the most amount of supply because Uber drivers,

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they work for Uber because there's demand for them to work. A lot of them

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aren't doing lift because they have to wait around for their shift. So definitely in

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nursing home space, it's a generalist type of field for nurses.

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You don't have to be an ICU nurse, but you do have to have some

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great experience. But a lot of the nurses have done nursing homes before in

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the past. They can go back very easy, and they can

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jump back into it. So it definitely allows the flexibility for that nursing

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pool and for the CNA staff as well. Well, a couple of things.

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Sure. So if there are operators, they're saying, how can we just take Uber

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driver off the street and put them into the nursing home? So how do you

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deal with compliance background checks and licensing

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and all that? How do I take someone off the street and know that they're

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safe and incomplete to provide care for my residents?

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Sure. That's the administrator and me talking. Yeah, of course. We started

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off doing a traditional agency type of recruiting,

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going through verifying their license, verifying their references. Something that we're going through

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now is the Joint Commission accreditation. So we've added on Skills checklist,

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we've added on Joint Commission competency exams. We've added all the

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additional tests, testing, competency exams,

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training that you could possibly have in addition to the compliance

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checks, which is state approved background checks. And I'll say in Massachusetts, it's pretty easy.

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The Quarry check is a pretty online, streamlined system.

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When we moved into other states, we've moved into Ohio. It's a

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lot of fingerprint systems, which we haven't gotten in Massachusetts yet. But the other ones,

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it involves a little bit more complexity. I'm hoping Massachusetts pushes this way

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and other states push to it that they have a fingerprint background system. But,

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you know, it's OIG checks, Sam checks, all these different checks that you're

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doing at your facilities. We're doing no different. I think the one thing that we

15:57.745 --> 16:01.662
are doing is we're running some bots to continuously check OIGs,

16:01.737 --> 16:05.127
continuously check to see if there's any nursing license findings.

16:05.307 --> 16:09.207
So there's some additional features we're doing that I don't necessarily think that all nursing

16:09.222 --> 16:12.907
homes are capable of doing. I haven't seen a software solution out there for

16:13.060 --> 16:16.417
that. But it's very much what you're doing. But I think the difference is

16:16.465 --> 16:19.927
that we have, you know, after they start working, we have this minimal package which

16:19.945 --> 16:23.572
is rather robust to get them going. As far as Credentialing, then it's that real

16:23.605 --> 16:27.052
time reviewing, because a lot of the stuff that goes on

16:27.070 --> 16:30.732
the field may be a professional aspect of somebody having bad communication, which you wouldn't

16:30.747 --> 16:34.077
see in the first interview. But we're getting all the feedback every single shift

16:34.107 --> 16:37.977
to actually re rate retrain. And if they're not succeeding

16:38.007 --> 16:41.422
in the network, we're kicking them out. Are you offering any level

16:41.455 --> 16:45.237
of support to help them succeed? Yes, we have a full operation

16:45.312 --> 16:48.757
team. Well, let me add to that. So we have gamification in

16:48.760 --> 16:51.847
our system that we reward our employees for getting

16:51.880 --> 16:55.332
ranked high, for showing up on time, for not calling out of their shifts.

16:55.422 --> 16:59.427
So that system actually brings them into levels. We have a bronze,

16:59.457 --> 17:03.147
gold, platinum level that once they start hitting the high levels, they're getting bonus

17:03.267 --> 17:06.802
structured for the amount of shift they complete, they're eligible for bonuses. So to be

17:06.820 --> 17:10.572
in that level, you have to really perform and get really good reviews from clients.

17:10.692 --> 17:14.577
So there's definitely more that we're getting to that point. But definitely we're motivating

17:14.682 --> 17:17.917
and demotivating people to do particular acts, which is basically

17:17.965 --> 17:21.597
perform at a high level. Yeah, it's basically their reviews.

17:21.717 --> 17:25.087
The feedback directly impacts their compensation. Absolutely, yes.

17:25.150 --> 17:29.287
All right. At least bonus structure. We don't like to pay different rates. Rates are

17:29.425 --> 17:32.872
based on the demand of the nursing home. If a nursing home is having

17:32.905 --> 17:36.372
a really hard time filling, we will increase rates

17:36.417 --> 17:39.942
to get that nursing home filled. We want to support all our businesses.

17:40.077 --> 17:43.027
The price that they see will be the same based on that shift. But if

17:43.045 --> 17:46.257
they're performing, they'll get bonuses on top of that, on top of what they're

17:46.272 --> 17:49.972
actually saying for prices. So what would you say to,

17:50.080 --> 17:53.767
let's say, administrative operators? A lot of people are very wary of

17:53.815 --> 17:57.507
bringing in agency staff. And I know you may or may not define

17:57.522 --> 18:00.952
your company as agency, and some of the reasons are

18:01.045 --> 18:04.552
practical, operational, as you mentioned earlier, that you

18:04.570 --> 18:07.857
bring someone off the street who doesn't understand the dynamics of the building. They don't

18:07.872 --> 18:11.067
know the culture, might not know any specific clinical

18:11.127 --> 18:14.922
needs. And many times the level of care, even for a good agency nurse,

18:14.967 --> 18:18.352
is less than acceptable or at least challenging. A good

18:18.370 --> 18:21.252
agency nurse will be good, but it will be a challenge.

18:21.357 --> 18:24.702
And then the other concern is that some agency nurses,

18:24.732 --> 18:27.982
unfortunately, really from their performance, it seems to be

18:27.985 --> 18:30.747
apparent that they couldn't care less the goals they want to get through the shift

18:30.792 --> 18:34.522
and get paid. So that's one concern, is the level of care. Actually, let's focus

18:34.555 --> 18:38.302
on that first. So I would be reluctant to allow,

18:38.470 --> 18:41.752
even if it's in telecare, at the same time, they don't have a

18:41.770 --> 18:45.247
connection to the building. How do you address that? Yeah, kind of two questions.

18:45.355 --> 18:48.927
There are kind of conditions. One is sending a nurse that's unfamiliar

18:48.957 --> 18:52.507
with their facility just because the complexities where's the glucometer? Where's all

18:52.510 --> 18:55.537
this other information that you need to know when you get there? We do have

18:55.600 --> 18:59.467
options with facilities that in our system, you can show up an hour early before

18:59.515 --> 19:03.262
your shift. There is some facilities out there that have gone and

19:03.325 --> 19:06.667
thrown on different type of orientations, which doesn't as much

19:06.715 --> 19:10.027
work for the on demand culture, but we can also accommodate that.

19:10.120 --> 19:13.227
I think right now, my mom's in a nursing home. She went for a rehab

19:13.257 --> 19:16.447
patient and she's at a facility that we're not staffing and they don't use

19:16.480 --> 19:19.527
agency. And when I'm there and I see all of a sudden there's a bunch

19:19.557 --> 19:22.807
of call outs and there's actually a nurse or nursing assistant taking on

19:22.885 --> 19:26.452
double the amount of patients to say that having an

19:26.470 --> 19:29.952
agency nurse there to help. They may not be performing

19:29.982 --> 19:33.432
right away at 100%, but if they're performing at 80% because they're

19:33.447 --> 19:37.467
not familiar with some systems, somebody there is far better than nobody

19:37.527 --> 19:40.787
there. If you're taking on double the load, it is unsafe.

19:41.362 --> 19:45.022
It's not good for patient care, particularly known in my family situation.

19:45.130 --> 19:47.677
I'm kind of wishing, hey, let's staff them just so we can get somebody here.

19:47.695 --> 19:51.517
Because not having anybody there and having her wait for 2

19:51.565 --> 19:55.032
hours with the call light is just unacceptable. And that's what happens when you don't

19:55.047 --> 19:59.017
have the staff there. Now, the second question, I believe it

19:59.065 --> 20:02.577
was in relation to nursing quality. The nurses

20:02.607 --> 20:05.647
that we're sending, are they just not caring? Are they just kind of the ones

20:05.680 --> 20:08.992
that float around to different agencies? And I've seen that, I've seen

20:09.040 --> 20:12.682
nurses that float to agency to agency and they get fired and they kind of

20:12.685 --> 20:16.347
keep on hustling around different agencies. I would say the staffing agencies

20:16.392 --> 20:19.572
that are having them don't have a good system of quality, of ranking,

20:19.617 --> 20:22.657
of actually acting fast based on information.

20:22.810 --> 20:26.722
I mean, there are individuals that could potentially scam anybody to

20:26.755 --> 20:30.022
get hired into a spot, particularly when nursing home is really

20:30.055 --> 20:33.117
desperate for hiring somebody, interviews. Well, in a facility,

20:33.177 --> 20:35.827
you can really recognize this person isn't performing. You can get them out of the

20:35.845 --> 20:39.672
door. For an agency that doesn't have feedback, that kind of loop of feedback

20:39.717 --> 20:43.077
that shows what they're doing, who's performing, who's not performing,

20:43.182 --> 20:46.837
and somebody follow up consistently from our clinical team

20:46.975 --> 20:50.122
back and forth with the clinical employee and the nursing home.

20:50.230 --> 20:53.377
That's when somebody stays in the agency and they just kind of ride the

20:53.395 --> 20:56.452
system and they stay on for a while until something really bad happens.

20:56.620 --> 21:00.102
With our technology, with our systems and processes in place, we're catching

21:00.132 --> 21:03.427
that much, much earlier than somebody else. So the chance of

21:03.445 --> 21:06.837
that happening is very, very minimal compared to another agency.

21:06.987 --> 21:10.747
Got it? Okay, so it is possible. I mean, you'll have one of those people

21:10.780 --> 21:14.182
who do float from agency and that they will be in the system for

21:14.185 --> 21:17.662
a while. Basically you're saying that the feedback is real and it's in real time

21:17.725 --> 21:20.782
and you can act on it as opposed to a regular agency. That like you

21:20.785 --> 21:24.007
just said, that I guess until something really bad totally kill somebody.

21:24.160 --> 21:27.502
Unfortunately they'll stay in the other agency for longer. For us,

21:27.520 --> 21:30.942
it'll be out right away. I mean, of course we're pre checking, we're doing competency

21:31.002 --> 21:34.122
testing, things like that. But as you know, you may have hired

21:34.167 --> 21:37.522
somebody that and other administrators out there that may have hired somebody that didn't work

21:37.555 --> 21:40.872
out. That happens. But how fast can you react to that in a facility?

21:40.917 --> 21:43.522
You can see it right away. Our goal is to be able to see that

21:43.555 --> 21:46.972
just as well as a facility sees that if that ever does happen, we act

21:47.005 --> 21:50.862
right away so that person doesn't continue working in the network. What about pricing?

21:50.937 --> 21:53.977
So we know that one of the reasons why they had a place where you

21:53.995 --> 21:57.582
just experienced that there was a nursing shortage and they didn't call in an agency.

21:57.672 --> 22:01.567
Because bringing that agency nurse, even assuming that it's the perfect person

22:01.615 --> 22:04.462
who's going to compliment everyone who's already there,

22:04.600 --> 22:08.542
it is going to be beneficial for the staff. At the end of the day,

22:08.590 --> 22:12.277
the price points, maybe not the nurse themselves might not be making that

22:12.295 --> 22:16.027
much more money, but they're charging because they need to make money. So how do

22:16.045 --> 22:19.587
your pricing, I guess compared to regular agencies,

22:19.662 --> 22:23.307
and this is something that I think could be a big benefit,

22:23.397 --> 22:26.227
how do you deal with that? I don't work in the pricing sector, but I

22:26.245 --> 22:29.722
can talk upon it. We're competitively priced. We're not in the low end

22:29.755 --> 22:33.232
of agency. But I would have to say that from a business

22:33.310 --> 22:36.757
perspective, which you know much more about the business of nursing home than I do,

22:36.835 --> 22:40.522
we do have clients that have started using us that used to be three star

22:40.555 --> 22:44.247
staffing for CMS, and we brought them up to five star staffing. So overall

22:44.292 --> 22:47.872
picture of their future potential profitability, I think

22:47.905 --> 22:51.747
that using US is probably a little bit less than overtime

22:51.792 --> 22:55.822
rates of their own individual clinical employees. So it's worth

22:55.855 --> 22:59.427
in the long run what I believe is safe staffing increasing

22:59.457 --> 23:03.177
your Star rating, having your overall employee pool not ditch

23:03.207 --> 23:06.502
out on you because they're working too much. So I think there's been studies out

23:06.520 --> 23:10.057
there that have shown both ways that agencies cost more or less now

23:10.210 --> 23:13.402
as CMS and different type of payment restructuring models are

23:13.420 --> 23:16.822
actually going out there, and star rating and facility referrals is

23:16.855 --> 23:20.317
becoming more important, some of our bigger clients have been able to

23:20.365 --> 23:24.187
boost up their overall Star ratings. We don't have studies yet

23:24.250 --> 23:27.547
on their turnover for their own internal employees, but I can go out there and

23:27.580 --> 23:31.032
bet that with them working less overtime, they're going to be sticking

23:31.047 --> 23:34.357
with them longer. So I don't have definitely a solid answer. I don't have a

23:34.360 --> 23:37.432
white paper on it yet, something that I'm definitely looking to work on, but I

23:37.435 --> 23:40.872
would say that the cost is competitive to other agencies.

23:40.917 --> 23:43.872
But you get a lot more than you would for an agency just doing block

23:43.917 --> 23:47.422
booking versus us filling in and stopping that mandatory overtime of

23:47.455 --> 23:51.022
your current employees. Okay, so just to clarify here,

23:51.055 --> 23:54.927
because I actually wasn't sure about this point. So your pricing is saying it's

23:54.957 --> 23:58.212
competitive with other agencies in the agencies,

23:58.287 --> 24:02.652
other staffing agencies in the industry. However, where other agencies

24:02.757 --> 24:06.352
are, maybe they're just allowing the facility to continue to

24:06.370 --> 24:10.327
operate. They're actually helping solve the problem because you're not taking an

24:10.345 --> 24:14.377
agency nurse. I think what operators are concerned about. Is that

24:14.395 --> 24:17.422
you're going to come in with an agency. So we need to hire a full

24:17.455 --> 24:20.737
time nurse from seven to three or five days a week.

24:20.800 --> 24:24.427
So if you're going to have an agency take that shift, there's nothing making the

24:24.445 --> 24:27.727
facility replace that agency person. The band aid is on, it's going

24:27.745 --> 24:31.222
to stay and that's very expensive and sometimes that could be more than

24:31.255 --> 24:34.702
over time. The amount that the difference between what the

24:34.720 --> 24:38.632
facility is paying and what the agency is charging and that could be

24:38.635 --> 24:42.427
a serious concern. However, if like you're saying that you're stopping the

24:42.445 --> 24:45.847
bleeding or at least as a main focus and the other

24:45.880 --> 24:49.627
nurses see you as a resource, the facility sees you as a resource and

24:49.645 --> 24:53.352
you can actually help with the most crucial with call outs.

24:53.382 --> 24:56.827
And of course the nurses, after turning out to call outs, they're going to

24:56.845 --> 24:59.527
leave because they can't deal with it and they have a life as well and

24:59.545 --> 25:03.472
they can't stay 16 hours shift three times a week. Yeah, that's exactly correct.

25:03.505 --> 25:06.352
You know, we do provide a band aid. So if you lose one of your

25:06.370 --> 25:10.102
staff, I mean we can cover you for 80 hours a week.

25:10.120 --> 25:13.177
We can cover you for 120 hours a week. Some facilities go much more than

25:13.195 --> 25:16.792
that, but it gives the Dyn and the administrator and the schedule time

25:16.840 --> 25:20.767
to go recruit their own staff. Sometimes they're just trying to deal with their own

25:20.815 --> 25:23.677
mess and trying to fix what's going on, but they actually don't have time to

25:23.695 --> 25:26.947
really reach out, to really even take some of our staff as

25:26.980 --> 25:30.507
a really good performer and ask them to transition to their own staff. And that's

25:30.522 --> 25:33.892
something that facilities in around the whole country have done before,

25:33.940 --> 25:37.702
is find really good staff in Telecare and worked out a deal to actually have

25:37.720 --> 25:40.947
them come on staff with them. So that works as well. But it's a band

25:40.992 --> 25:44.227
aid so you can actually deal with your own stuff going

25:44.245 --> 25:47.392
on rather than the do in covering shift itself. Right. Which only

25:47.440 --> 25:51.007
exasperates the problem because the Dyn is going to be the one that's supposed to

25:51.010 --> 25:54.687
be finding the appropriate candidates and if she's

25:54.762 --> 25:58.642
or he's on a cart and filling shifts, then that doesn't work

25:58.765 --> 26:02.677
and that makes it even worse. And another point also is that

26:02.770 --> 26:05.947
as long as there's that you're trying to hire staff in

26:05.980 --> 26:09.742
a rush because the other one is just too tired, you're going to take anybody,

26:09.865 --> 26:12.922
as long as there's no big red X on them, then they're going to be

26:12.955 --> 26:16.507
hired. If they're available and you're stuck with them, you're stuck with them.

26:16.585 --> 26:20.362
And sometimes I think that's good because I'll pick up shifts, but sometimes

26:20.425 --> 26:24.502
I'll just make the problem worse. They start calling out as opposed to

26:24.595 --> 26:28.327
calming things down. There's that tension every time somebody calls out like, oh my

26:28.345 --> 26:32.362
goodness, who's gonna have to stay tonight? And now people started yelling at each other,

26:32.425 --> 26:36.517
and yet it's not pleasant. So with having such a system in place,

26:36.640 --> 26:40.497
you can definitely help with that. Are there any facilities that staff exclusively

26:40.542 --> 26:44.062
within telecom? Does that even make sense? Yeah, I think in the business

26:44.125 --> 26:48.102
side and the the company, they're looking at the PBJ data, but there are nursing

26:48.132 --> 26:51.397
homes out there that are exclusive within Telecare because we can meet

26:51.430 --> 26:55.002
all their needs, including more consistency. So they're

26:55.032 --> 26:58.672
booking out a long period of chunks. 10% of their staff is

26:58.705 --> 27:02.502
actually being utilized by intelligence and there's no reason to have other agencies.

27:02.607 --> 27:05.922
There still is nursing homes out there that I see that they're kind of stuck

27:05.967 --> 27:09.402
on this the block booking. They're using two other agencies

27:09.432 --> 27:12.727
and they're kind of continuously coming. And I know that you said that sometimes the

27:12.745 --> 27:15.702
higher up corporate level doesn't like that because you're not getting your own staff.

27:15.732 --> 27:19.342
They're still doing that and they're supplementing us using for call us using

27:19.390 --> 27:23.427
for if their census rises and falls. That's something that we're definitely expanding

27:23.457 --> 27:27.072
into because we realize that sometimes it is better to use one source

27:27.117 --> 27:29.977
and have the quality and all the records and all the data you can pull

27:29.995 --> 27:33.372
for PPj data and GPH reports and things like that when surveyors

27:33.417 --> 27:36.967
come. So we're working to enhance our service to if you do

27:37.015 --> 27:39.987
want to have block booking out there, we can replace your other agency.

27:40.062 --> 27:43.737
But right now we have been a good chunk of our clients

27:43.812 --> 27:47.467
have been exclusive with us. There's other chunks that are still using other agencies just

27:47.515 --> 27:51.262
because they've been stuck with this not stuck, but they really like this one person

27:51.325 --> 27:54.247
or two persons. I'm a CNN or nurse and they want to have them keep

27:54.280 --> 27:57.532
on coming the same schedule. Right. That's interesting. What I

27:57.535 --> 28:00.732
meant was question was if anyone staffed their entire facility

28:00.822 --> 28:03.967
with intelligence as opposed to other agencies. Yeah,

28:04.015 --> 28:07.717
so I've seen it done before. When we started three or four years ago,

28:07.765 --> 28:10.932
I was the first nurse going out to these facilities. Now we've

28:10.947 --> 28:14.052
had a total of 8000 nurses and nursing assistants. So I don't

28:14.082 --> 28:17.452
staff as much. But there's 8000 nurses and nursing assistant right

28:17.470 --> 28:21.052
now in intelligence that have worked for us yes, in the past.

28:21.220 --> 28:24.982
Each week right now it's between two and 3000

28:25.060 --> 28:28.642
or in six states right now. And some nurses come on and they

28:28.690 --> 28:32.272
work once a month. Sometimes they work once every three months and some do more

28:32.305 --> 28:35.707
full time work with us. But in regards to that question

28:35.860 --> 28:38.917
exclusive, when we first started off,

28:39.040 --> 28:42.487
we were trying to fill 100% shift no matter what.

28:42.550 --> 28:46.437
We're still working on that goal, but we would do anything, including losing

28:46.512 --> 28:49.822
our own money and business, to just fill your shift. We did

28:49.855 --> 28:53.302
staff some facilities that I've been to personally that there

28:53.320 --> 28:57.142
are three units and two nurses on each unit. And we were staffing six

28:57.190 --> 29:00.432
nurses per shift. Then for CNAs, I see that we're

29:00.447 --> 29:03.952
staffing eight CNAs, and I'm thinking to myself, well, where's their

29:03.970 --> 29:07.707
own staff? How can you run a whole facility on agency personnel?

29:07.797 --> 29:11.127
I don't personally agree with that. I think that it's

29:11.157 --> 29:14.082
good to have your own staff there. So when the agency comes in, if they're

29:14.097 --> 29:17.677
not familiar with it, they haven't been going consistently, and not all of the

29:17.695 --> 29:20.677
nurses that have been there 20 times, when you hit a certain point of being

29:20.695 --> 29:24.112
there 20 times, you probably feel pretty comfortable with that unit. But it's happened

29:24.175 --> 29:27.547
before that. We may have staffed the whole unit, and they have an

29:27.580 --> 29:31.197
on call there as well, but most facilities

29:31.242 --> 29:34.402
out there don't do that. And I don't necessarily think it's the best thing of

29:34.420 --> 29:38.157
staffing your whole facility with agency. So we've had talks with these individuals

29:38.172 --> 29:42.037
that have done it before and say, hey, it's not best practice. I understand

29:42.100 --> 29:44.452
that our staff has been a lot of times, but you still need to have

29:44.470 --> 29:47.692
some of your own agencies. It's very, very rare. I don't think it happened.

29:47.740 --> 29:51.922
It happened before in the past. And I would say that usually just

29:51.955 --> 29:55.602
looking at the numbers, it's 5%, 10% of their staff is ours.

29:55.632 --> 29:58.797
If you actually look at the PBJ data compared to one shift,

29:58.842 --> 30:02.517
somebody may have done it before the past. Now, in your interactions

30:02.577 --> 30:05.917
now with facilities, in your role as the

30:05.965 --> 30:09.702
Cofounder in Tel Acare, is there any practices

30:09.807 --> 30:14.037
specifically in regards to staffing that strike you as surprising

30:14.187 --> 30:17.407
from the outsider's perspective and what you

30:17.485 --> 30:21.417
see or feel is prevalent in nursing home operations?

30:21.552 --> 30:24.727
In your interactions, like, are you coming across things that are

30:24.745 --> 30:28.302
like, wow, they should, why they do things this way, or the opposite

30:28.332 --> 30:32.322
of like, wow, look how amazing they're doing it? They have Uber for dining

30:32.367 --> 30:36.057
trucks, for other innovations that nursing

30:36.072 --> 30:39.547
homes are using. It's hard to answer that. I do know

30:39.580 --> 30:43.327
our business. I know staffing. What I'm really hoping to

30:43.345 --> 30:47.002
get out of potentially supplement in the future of helping out,

30:47.020 --> 30:50.202
as I see some needs for internal scheduling software

30:50.307 --> 30:53.667
from the workforce management. I've seen some of the rating machines

30:53.727 --> 30:57.547
that you've talked about your podcast before, that families can rate particular

30:57.655 --> 31:00.907
experiences, which would also be rating our nurses, because our

31:00.910 --> 31:04.777
nurses are their nurses when they're there. I've seen over the

31:04.795 --> 31:09.027
last couple of years, many facilities switching over to EMR systems

31:09.057 --> 31:12.222
because there's still major corporations out there that haven't

31:12.267 --> 31:16.107
upgraded to the Matrix or the PCC. And that's a little bit harder

31:16.122 --> 31:20.142
from a staffing standpoint of sending nurses in there to do paper documents.

31:20.277 --> 31:23.572
It's easy to miss records and things like that. So I've definitely seen

31:23.605 --> 31:27.127
the evolving of a more digital sense, and some of

31:27.145 --> 31:30.427
the shocking moments are really what? That's not optional to

31:30.445 --> 31:33.457
go to Amar. I mean, I kept on pushing it off. I actually don't know

31:33.535 --> 31:37.477
what the final deadline is. Maybe you know better than I do, but everyone was

31:37.495 --> 31:40.867
supposed to have already been electronic. There are still facilities that

31:40.990 --> 31:44.647
you send us to that are on paper, there are in Massachusetts or other

31:44.680 --> 31:48.127
states. In all states, it's the select few of facilities that are

31:48.145 --> 31:51.732
out there. Usually they're part of a corporation that really hasn't upgraded their systems.

31:51.822 --> 31:55.267
They're definitely transitioning, and I've seen more transition over the last

31:55.315 --> 31:58.872
couple of months. But from a standpoint of an agency

31:58.917 --> 32:02.022
nurse coming in, it's actually much better to be in a computerized

32:02.067 --> 32:05.467
system because just managing that long book of different

32:05.515 --> 32:09.472
records that some pages are falling out and things like that, it turns into

32:09.655 --> 32:13.227
a lot of nurses coming back because they didn't see a page. So it's

32:13.257 --> 32:16.782
usually some of the big corporate facilities that have been transitioned,

32:16.797 --> 32:19.957
but they're still in process of it. So I've seen that highly recommend

32:20.035 --> 32:23.892
as CMS mandating, to switch over to computerized copies

32:23.952 --> 32:26.912
or medical administration records. It would make my job a lot easier.

32:29.437 --> 32:33.447
Yeah, it would make everyone's job better. Patient care overall. You mentioned scheduling

32:33.492 --> 32:36.907
software. I've worked with a bunch myself. Is there anything in particular

32:37.060 --> 32:41.202
that you would think should be included in a good scheduling software?

32:41.307 --> 32:44.347
Yeah, I've seen some products out there that are

32:44.380 --> 32:47.752
starting to implement this. Usually they're expensive, but it's running your

32:47.770 --> 32:51.607
own internal pergian workforce. I think that's kind of the key to the future.

32:51.760 --> 32:55.432
Right now. We consider our self workforce management where staffing outside

32:55.510 --> 32:59.502
nurses to COVID shifts. We definitely feel like either partnering

32:59.532 --> 33:03.022
with a solution that uses our technology, their technology,

33:03.130 --> 33:06.802
to supplement your own internal pool, and it may be harder to run that with

33:06.820 --> 33:10.282
a small facility. But if you can bulk up your different facilities that

33:10.285 --> 33:13.702
are relatively close to each other in a corporate chain of five or ten and

33:13.720 --> 33:17.152
as well as using the same system almost as a VMs to connect with your

33:17.170 --> 33:21.202
agencies. I definitely think there's a big opportunity for

33:21.295 --> 33:25.042
not just taking that to the hospital system, but down to the nursing home level

33:25.165 --> 33:28.162
and putting that into a package that kind of combines everything,

33:28.225 --> 33:31.797
and it just makes it one system. I think there's a lot of inefficiencies

33:31.842 --> 33:35.272
or it's communicating with your own workforce. I've worked a lot of facilities before,

33:35.305 --> 33:38.827
and they're making phone calls at five, six in the morning trying to get you

33:38.920 --> 33:41.797
using the same technology we're doing, using with in, app,

33:41.830 --> 33:45.282
notifications, a bunch of different other methods of getting people to pick up shifts

33:45.372 --> 33:48.642
with your own pool is definitely going to be of benefit.

33:48.702 --> 33:52.402
Now people are doing tech groups and WhatsApp groups and things like

33:52.420 --> 33:55.867
that. We have a shift and people responding to the whole group

33:55.915 --> 33:59.247
and they should have been private messaging. And it's effective.

33:59.367 --> 34:02.887
It's much more effective than it used to be. Specifically WhatsApp which

34:02.950 --> 34:06.247
a lot of people use. But at the same time, there's no

34:06.280 --> 34:09.697
real way to track who said, what? You have to go back. That happens also

34:09.730 --> 34:13.297
a lot of times I know from schedulers I've worked with that

34:13.405 --> 34:17.122
unless they pick up a shift and some, you know, they respond in

34:17.155 --> 34:20.647
some means, let's say on a text, and then they don't show up and they

34:20.680 --> 34:23.452
pick up the shift. You have to find the go at your phone, try to

34:23.470 --> 34:27.027
find a text, remember what time it was and take a screenshot

34:27.057 --> 34:30.322
and send it and like no, you did. The nature of it would

34:30.355 --> 34:33.502
have to be, I mean, I guess web based system might be nice, but I

34:33.520 --> 34:36.352
think it would have to be a mobile app because it's just the nature of

34:36.370 --> 34:39.472
the business. We're not talking about people sitting in an office. We're talking about someone

34:39.505 --> 34:42.612
at the dinner table getting a text from someone in the facility

34:42.687 --> 34:45.877
that someone just called out or maybe even a better system for calling out as

34:45.895 --> 34:48.652
well because that also who do you call out to? Do you call out to

34:48.670 --> 34:51.822
the nurse manager called to the Dom? Do you call it to the scheduler?

34:51.867 --> 34:55.477
What happened? The schedulers not there. The schedule is all and I called out and

34:55.495 --> 34:57.802
then, yeah, but the nursery had to write it down or they wrote it down

34:57.820 --> 35:00.967
somewhere, but then telling me what these things happen all the time.

35:01.015 --> 35:04.057
Yeah, it happens on the weekend especially. There's more call outs on the weekend and

35:04.060 --> 35:07.287
there's nobody really there to manage the call outs in some facilities.

35:07.362 --> 35:10.777
So the spring fever items, right, and it's a nice day

35:10.795 --> 35:13.582
to go to the beach and all of a sudden everyone's not fairly well.

35:13.660 --> 35:17.122
They post on Facebook and pictures. So there's a lot of technology that

35:17.155 --> 35:20.772
we can in the future and other companies will be doing as well. Is bringing

35:20.817 --> 35:24.597
the same type of on demand status and mobile apps into your scheduling

35:24.642 --> 35:27.807
platform. And a lot of our clients are using Excel spreadsheets.

35:27.897 --> 35:31.522
They're using our schedule. It is bringing that into a

35:31.555 --> 35:34.927
premium version that somebody could use that's not expensive because I

35:34.945 --> 35:38.232
understand that there are tools out there that are really targeted to hospitals

35:38.247 --> 35:41.377
that are going into nursing homes and they charge you hundreds if not thousands of

35:41.395 --> 35:44.952
dollars a month. Sometimes it's cost inhibited and some of the administrators,

35:44.982 --> 35:48.297
in a higher level, their opinion could be like, oh well, we have a scheduler

35:48.342 --> 35:52.227
for that, figure it out. Well, yeah, we can figure it out, but it's

35:52.257 --> 35:55.297
not that effective. It's not that efficient and it doesn't really work that well.

35:55.330 --> 35:58.747
We can do it much better. Right. So the problem with that, the problem

35:58.780 --> 36:02.002
with that type of mindset, and it's true, is that if

36:02.020 --> 36:05.652
it's just going to make someone's job easier and it doesn't dollar and cents

36:05.682 --> 36:09.492
bring me in more revenue or cut expenses, then finance

36:09.627 --> 36:13.297
whoever makes those financial decisions, at the end of the day, it's hard.

36:13.480 --> 36:16.492
So I'm happy that the schedule is going to go home

36:16.540 --> 36:19.767
and be nicer to his or her spouse or whoever

36:19.827 --> 36:23.407
they meet on their way, that's great because I'm paying for a

36:23.410 --> 36:26.107
better software for them when they could have figured out themselves.

36:26.260 --> 36:29.862
But if we can prove how it's beneficial financially,

36:29.937 --> 36:32.752
you could say, well, it's not just going to be easier, but it's actually going

36:32.770 --> 36:36.477
to decrease overtime or employee satisfaction or retention.

36:36.582 --> 36:40.282
Increase turnover. Absolutely right. It's going to decrease turnover because

36:40.435 --> 36:43.642
they know that when they call out it's going to get to the right person

36:43.690 --> 36:47.152
because everyone gets that notification in real time and they

36:47.170 --> 36:50.047
know that they're going to be held accounts well and they're okay with that because

36:50.155 --> 36:53.137
transparency, some people are still scared to put everything.

36:53.275 --> 36:56.572
They're scared to have conversations like this that are recorded in

36:56.605 --> 37:00.202
videos and putting anything out on social media because people are

37:00.220 --> 37:04.737
going to see. But most people are biting the bullet and welcoming the transparency

37:04.812 --> 37:07.897
and the honesty that it brings out in people because you can't just get

37:07.930 --> 37:11.707
out there anymore and just tweet about whatever you want. I think

37:11.785 --> 37:14.122
that no one's going to see it. I'm not referring to anyone for this.

37:14.155 --> 37:18.117
I was just saying in general, there's a certain level of accountability that exists

37:18.252 --> 37:21.667
when we have this technology affords us this level of

37:21.715 --> 37:25.297
transparency and, you know, we can actually see who people

37:25.330 --> 37:28.942
are and how they interact with people. So my point is that

37:29.065 --> 37:32.847
if you can show decision makers have dollars and cents,

37:32.967 --> 37:36.307
this is going to be not just easier. I mean, I've worked with

37:36.310 --> 37:40.452
some really primitive systems going back a few years where the selling

37:40.482 --> 37:44.517
point was you're getting away from the spreadsheets. But there are some very basic

37:44.652 --> 37:48.472
texting systems inside. We could send the initial text out from

37:48.505 --> 37:51.727
the system to a million people, but you can't see the responses and you have

37:51.745 --> 37:54.202
to go back to your phone and it doesn't sync and you don't know who

37:54.220 --> 37:57.532
said what. And some of them were fairly costly and at

37:57.535 --> 38:00.712
the same time not very effective because that wasn't the focus.

38:00.775 --> 38:04.152
The focus was scheduling the shift. Their focus was knowing what's

38:04.182 --> 38:06.907
going on. If you're a nurse, you come and you see your name on the

38:06.910 --> 38:10.647
schedule and you don't think that you're supposed to work then or the opposite,

38:10.692 --> 38:13.002
you come in and you schedule your whole day and you come to schedule,

38:13.032 --> 38:16.527
you're not on. That also makes people not come back. So they solve

38:16.557 --> 38:19.827
that problem well where when people are on, they're supposed to be on. When they're

38:19.857 --> 38:23.472
off, they're off. But as far as the communication piece that they haven't

38:23.517 --> 38:26.887
done yet. So I'm expecting you guys to work this out, right?

38:26.950 --> 38:30.352
Yeah, I mean, we haven't seen too many solutions out

38:30.370 --> 38:33.592
there that really have adjusted for nursing homes, there has been

38:33.640 --> 38:37.542
a couple, but we're open to partnering with other solutions and enhancing

38:37.602 --> 38:42.132
their services, linking up with different type of VMs system or MSP

38:42.222 --> 38:45.697
for an individual facility that runs their own per diem pool. What was

38:45.730 --> 38:49.522
VMs? MSP. So it is basically two

38:49.630 --> 38:53.152
systems of EMS. You usually are a group that contracts out

38:53.170 --> 38:56.907
with a bunch of different agencies. MSP is almost a managed

38:56.922 --> 39:00.352
service provider. It's the same thing. But somebody, another company is actually running this for

39:00.370 --> 39:03.772
you. And we see this in the staffing world that bigger hospitals run

39:03.805 --> 39:07.042
these services. And I know particularly Genesis, they do

39:07.090 --> 39:10.807
this type of system, they use this platform where they're connecting all their agencies and

39:10.810 --> 39:14.587
they're also having something manage it for them. Our idea is to have this

39:14.650 --> 39:18.342
kind of scheduled platform that you're running your own pool

39:18.402 --> 39:21.682
and you're running ours. Hopefully it will be within ours or an

39:21.685 --> 39:25.702
integration with another vendor that actually delivers good service. But it's the

39:25.720 --> 39:28.737
price. The price that we can reasonably

39:28.812 --> 39:32.467
tell a nursing home if there obviously there's some reimbursement issues

39:32.515 --> 39:36.342
going on right now with nursing homes and how can we do it that's sustainable

39:36.402 --> 39:39.462
and is not too much of a sell, but also is functional.

39:39.537 --> 39:43.377
It provides value, it's not expensive. And because we're

39:43.407 --> 39:46.972
over here actually making a business on staffing that we can

39:47.005 --> 39:50.557
still reasonably provide this solution for you for a much cheaper cost.

39:50.710 --> 39:54.027
The vendors out there and the software vendors that just focus on scheduling

39:54.057 --> 39:57.177
sometimes, that's how they're trying to make all their money. They're trying to stay afloat

39:57.207 --> 40:00.822
as a business by just selling your software. And that's the margins that investors

40:00.867 --> 40:03.502
are looking for are high. They're looking to make a lot of money off the

40:03.520 --> 40:06.862
software. So we're in the world that we're doing another business.

40:06.925 --> 40:10.572
It's very relative to our business. And right now we're aggressively

40:10.617 --> 40:14.407
looking for partners or developing our own software to kind of connect

40:14.485 --> 40:17.922
that together to have the workforce management solution that's affordable.

40:18.042 --> 40:20.647
Also you can use some staffing if you need it. So you want to create

40:20.680 --> 40:24.177
the complete staffing solution for nursing homes.

40:24.207 --> 40:26.937
In other words, help them manage, maintain,

40:27.012 --> 40:30.427
retain their own internal staffing while at

40:30.445 --> 40:34.357
the same time supplementing as necessary. Yes, I am very

40:34.435 --> 40:37.597
proactively into two D and three

40:37.630 --> 40:41.197
D animation for clinical nurses as well. We're very

40:41.230 --> 40:45.252
much enhancing our education platform for our own nurses

40:45.432 --> 40:49.087
with this type of solution. I would love it's kind of my dream to have

40:49.150 --> 40:52.477
a platform that you can also provide CEOs to your own staff as well as

40:52.495 --> 40:56.602
our staff. That's the dream. Adding education to that. Yeah, we have education

40:56.695 --> 41:00.592
to our own nurses right now. We're enhancing it. We're adding different

41:00.640 --> 41:05.017
features, we're adding different diagnosis, change of conditions, things like that. And just

41:05.140 --> 41:08.797
plain straight patient handoff, the appropriate way to do a patient handoff to

41:08.830 --> 41:12.142
decrease falls, things like that are the basics. But you know, if we're training

41:12.190 --> 41:15.577
our own nurses, my dream out there, which I always look for in

41:15.595 --> 41:19.372
the future, is how can we push this to more nurses. There is

41:19.405 --> 41:23.002
technology out there that we're utilizing for our own. If a client out

41:23.020 --> 41:25.857
there in the future subscribes to our package,

41:25.947 --> 41:29.277
our scheduling workforce management system, how do we give them all the tools that we're

41:29.307 --> 41:32.572
developing for our 8000 cart nurses that we're working with

41:32.605 --> 41:35.802
right now? It's definitely far fetched, but we're

41:35.832 --> 41:38.977
looking to make big changes in the nursing home world. I think that a lot

41:38.995 --> 41:42.352
of companies are focused on big hospitals, and nursing home

41:42.370 --> 41:45.697
is always the kind of the secondary. Like, there's not enough money

41:45.730 --> 41:49.267
to be made. And I think that there's just so much patient care

41:49.315 --> 41:52.522
experience that you can increase in nursing homes. There's so much opportunity and

41:52.555 --> 41:55.642
money to be made. There is. It has to be a good price point

41:55.690 --> 41:59.562
for nursing homes because Medicaid is not reimbursed

41:59.712 --> 42:03.052
exactly. So that's our goal is of course we're going to keep

42:03.070 --> 42:06.547
on concentrating on staffing, but how do we add additional features that makes it better

42:06.580 --> 42:10.522
for nursing homes to increase their own workforce management? That's really our

42:10.555 --> 42:14.212
dream. So there are solutions that do provide certain

42:14.275 --> 42:18.052
levels of online learning for nurses. Some of

42:18.070 --> 42:22.057
it, they're expensive and some of them are limited. They're expensive because

42:22.210 --> 42:25.552
nursing, by definition, some things have to be hands on. But I like

42:25.570 --> 42:29.122
the idea that you're trying to use some advanced technology to

42:29.230 --> 42:33.297
be able to bridge that gap to some extent. Absolutely, yeah. You need some interactivity

42:33.342 --> 42:37.042
within a digital sense to really have somebody understand and to test

42:37.090 --> 42:40.012
off and to compensate on it. It's not just looking at a piece of paper,

42:40.075 --> 42:44.467
reading and then answering some questions that learning is not effective. Chris, it's really

42:44.590 --> 42:49.267
refreshing to see someone apply this level of technology to

42:49.390 --> 42:53.047
an industry that's traditionally very behind when it comes

42:53.080 --> 42:57.112
to these types of cutting edge solutions and

42:57.250 --> 43:01.062
really solving a real pain point. I mean, it seems from this conversation

43:01.137 --> 43:04.927
that being short staffed and the staffing agency problem on

43:04.945 --> 43:08.277
a personal level to you, and tell me if I'm wrong, was a painful

43:08.382 --> 43:11.902
problem. It was. You seem to be on a mission to make sure that

43:11.920 --> 43:15.652
the problem is decreased until it could exist as the

43:15.670 --> 43:20.232
least amount possible. And which is why you're not stopping at supplying

43:20.397 --> 43:24.402
nursing homes with nursing, which is wonderful. And CNAs,

43:24.432 --> 43:27.607
right? Yes, CNAs are a big part of our business for nursing homes as

43:27.610 --> 43:30.627
well. But we really want to turn into a full solution.

43:30.807 --> 43:34.312
So staffing is the agency piece,

43:34.450 --> 43:37.897
is what you have right now. But I'm just trying to envision the full thing.

43:38.005 --> 43:41.197
Presenting it to an owner or an operator is

43:41.230 --> 43:45.222
that we're the full service nursing home staffing provider.

43:45.267 --> 43:49.027
So we help you hire your own staff, we help you schedule your own

43:49.045 --> 43:52.437
staff to help you educate your own staff. We help you with retention.

43:52.512 --> 43:55.477
We help you when they call out. They have a way to do that.

43:55.495 --> 43:58.647
They have communication and when you need assistance,

43:58.767 --> 44:02.532
we can help you with this. And being that you're very well positioned,

44:02.622 --> 44:05.227
again, I think this is pretty much what you were saying before. You're pretty well

44:05.245 --> 44:08.547
positioned because you have this income from the agency.

44:08.667 --> 44:11.577
You can offer some of the other solutions, the software solutions,

44:11.607 --> 44:15.022
without charging that very high premium like other

44:15.055 --> 44:18.247
companies have to charge. The software itself is not

44:18.280 --> 44:22.222
necessarily the expensive part of the development, but once it's there,

44:22.330 --> 44:25.927
it's there. And if you have a team in house that can do

44:25.945 --> 44:29.547
such things, either in house or like you said, partnering, it sounds like really exciting

44:29.592 --> 44:32.797
things aren't to come down the road and you're just getting started.

44:32.905 --> 44:36.852
We are just getting started. And what you said is describes

44:36.882 --> 44:40.602
us. We do something really well right now. We're adding different solutions.

44:40.632 --> 44:43.972
We have an in house development team that is innovative. It's the things

44:44.005 --> 44:47.097
that we're doing aren't really out there, but of course we're bringing in some pieces

44:47.142 --> 44:49.852
out there that are out in the market that we think we can enhance but

44:49.870 --> 44:53.277
also provided lower cost, particularly for nursing

44:53.307 --> 44:56.512
homes. We are 99.5%

44:56.575 --> 45:00.052
nursing homes. There's been some assisted livings that have just asked to join and

45:00.070 --> 45:04.032
we supplement them because it's not much different. But we focus on nursing homes.

45:04.122 --> 45:07.647
And I think that technology has except for maybe PCC,

45:07.767 --> 45:11.047
has come to nursing homes in a big way. A lot of these other

45:11.155 --> 45:14.992
vendors have overlooked and really concentrated their resources on

45:15.040 --> 45:18.622
large, acute care, massive organizations, and they

45:18.655 --> 45:21.502
kind of left out nursing homes or they want to charge a real lot of

45:21.520 --> 45:25.327
money and nobody can afford the solution. So we're bringing that together in a

45:25.345 --> 45:28.897
package that's affordable and also keeping our staffing, which allows us to grow

45:28.930 --> 45:32.197
the other parts of our business. Awesome. I really appreciate your time,

45:32.230 --> 45:35.452
Chris, for sharing some of your knowledge and your background a little

45:35.470 --> 45:39.057
bit about your company. It's really exciting. It's really innovative

45:39.222 --> 45:43.267
technology. And tell me something in a real way. Our listeners want to

45:43.390 --> 45:47.092
learn more about your company and see if it's available in their state

45:47.215 --> 45:50.602
and understand how they can sign up and avail themselves to your

45:50.620 --> 45:54.157
services. Where is the best place to send them? Sure. Our website is

45:54.235 --> 45:59.017
Intellikare.com. It's intel y cere.com.

45:59.065 --> 46:02.377
We're on Facebook, Twitter and the rest of the social media platforms as

46:02.395 --> 46:05.647
well. Well, I really appreciate it. Any final thoughts before we

46:05.680 --> 46:09.127
let you go? It really is so innovative and we just

46:09.145 --> 46:12.172
need to kind of let this all sink in. But is there anything else that

46:12.205 --> 46:15.982
we don't know about your company that we should know before we

46:16.060 --> 46:20.472
close up this episode? Yeah, I think right now we're expanding into Illinois,

46:20.517 --> 46:24.397
New Jersey, so if anyone out there is in those two states, definitely look

46:24.430 --> 46:28.012
us up. We usually start off and within three,

46:28.075 --> 46:31.917
four months we're usually one of the bigger vendors

46:31.977 --> 46:35.647
of staffing. So we spread throughout the street pretty quickly. So looking forward to seeing

46:35.680 --> 46:39.172
you guys and girls out there from those dates. Awesome. Okay, that's good

46:39.205 --> 46:43.222
news. We certainly have listeners in both of those states, so head on

46:43.255 --> 46:46.467
to Intelligair.com. Chris, it's been a pleasure.

46:46.527 --> 46:50.150
Thank you so much for coming on the nursing home podcast. Thanks for having me.

46:54.187 --> 46:57.972
I hope you've enjoyed this episode of the nursing Home podcast.

46:58.092 --> 47:01.372
Be sure to share this episode with all of your friends in the nursing home

47:01.405 --> 47:05.917
industry and just tell them to head on over to the nursing homehomepodcast.com.

47:05.965 --> 47:09.382
In the meantime, head on over to itunes. Leave me an honest,

47:09.460 --> 47:13.072
wonderful review, take a screenshot of it, and I will send you a

47:13.105 --> 47:16.962
gift straight and special for you. Again, head on over to itunes.

47:17.112 --> 47:20.452
Leave me an honest review, take a screenshot of it

47:20.470 --> 47:23.527
and send it on over to me on LinkedIn, and I will be sure that

47:23.545 --> 47:26.962
we send something out special just for you.

47:27.100 --> 47:28.725
Have an awesome day.