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Home Care Marketing & Sales Mastery by Approved Senior Network®
Dawn Fiala, Lisa Marsolais, Annette Ziegler, and Valerie VanBooven RN BSN provide insight into home care marketing strategies. They cover in-person, in-field sales and online marketing every other week. These podcast episodes are part of the Home Care Marketing Mastermind, sponsored by Approved Senior Network®. Find more information at https://ASNHomeCareMarketing.com
Home Care Marketing & Sales Mastery by Approved Senior Network®
Beyond the Tumble: Building Your Agency Through Fall Prevention Expertise
When an elderly person falls, it often triggers a devastating cascade that extends far beyond physical injury. The statistics are alarming—one in four adults over 65 falls each year, with falls being the leading cause of emergency room visits and hospitalizations. For home care agencies, this represents both a critical mission and an exceptional growth opportunity.
Our latest Mastery Circle delves into comprehensive fall prevention strategies that position your agency as a proactive safety partner rather than just a care provider. We explore how implementing these approaches creates a powerful win-win: seniors stay safer in their homes while agencies build stronger referral relationships, particularly with hospitals and rehabilitation facilities eager to reduce readmissions.
The episode covers practical tools for success, including proper caregiver training techniques, home safety assessment protocols, and effective marketing strategies tailored for Fall Prevention Month. Our experts share insights on equipping caregivers with essential skills like transfer techniques, environmental hazard identification, and proper response when falls occur. You'll learn how offering complimentary safety assessments can get your foot in the door with potential clients who might not yet need full-time care.
We also address the profound psychological impact falls have on seniors—creating fear, reduced activity, isolation, and often depression—and how your caregivers can provide the confidence and support seniors need to maintain independence. The discussion includes creative marketing approaches like partnering with physical therapists, hosting community workshops, and using seasonal leave-behinds that highlight your expertise.
Ready to transform your approach to fall prevention while growing your agency? Download our exclusive assessment forms, marketing templates, and seasonal materials to implement these strategies immediately. Your commitment to keeping seniors safe doesn't just prevent falls—it builds trust, extends client retention, and differentiates your agency in a competitive market.
Continuum Mastery Circle Intro
Visit our website at https://asnhomecaremarketing.com
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Hi everyone, good afternoon, hello, hello, how's everybody doing? Hey, kara, I just saw you Long time, no see. Yay right, hey, anthony, hey how are? You hey welcome.
Speaker 3:Thank you.
Speaker 1:All right, I guess we'll get started. People are going to start trickling in, so welcome today to our Continue Mastery Circle. We're going to do some introductions. I will start. My name is Annette Ziegler and I've been with the Proof Senior Network for over a year. I am the sales training expert. I teach the sales training classes. I have 20-plus years home care experience and I love teaching people what worked for me, the tips and tricks, and just love teaching everybody what was successful for me to help me grow the home care agency that I worked in from 1 million to 4 million in sales and obtaining a lot of private play clients. So welcome, we'll go to you next, valerie. Okay.
Speaker 2:I'm Valerie Van Boeven. I think everybody has maybe heard my name, but I'm the co -owner of Approved Senior Network. I'm a registered nurse by trade and I've been around for a very long time. I'm like 200 years old in nurse years, so I'm surprised about humans. So, having said that, these ladies are your experts today, but I'm going to just chime in whenever I can.
Speaker 3:Okay, I'm Lisa Marcella. I have been in home care forever in a day probably 200 plus years or so but I'm happy to be on this end. I had two different loves. One was advertising and marketing in print back in the day if anyone knows what that is and then transitioning over to online digital space and then home care my very greatest love. So I love being on this end of it and being able to help everyone with your journey, and I will. Oh, I guess John Fiala will not be here today. She is hard at work on something else and I guess we can get started. She's working on something top secret, top secret.
Speaker 1:Top secret. Do you want to do housekeeping, Valerie?
Speaker 2:Sure, we say this every time Lines muted. Share stories, experiences and tips. If you have a story to share, we want to hear it. Ask questions you can put it in the chat area, or you can and Lisa, just put a chat in the chat area, or you can try to interrupt us, but we're talkers, so usually just putting it in the chat is the easiest way to get our attention. Make recommendations If there's something you want to talk about here, us talk about, let us know, and we really want to know what you want to know. Honestly, if there's something we haven't covered, okay, Great.
Speaker 1:Our agenda First. Yeah, we might as well put that in the chat, lisa. So at the end we have some fun leave-behinds and one attendee that is here today will receive a customized set of leave-behinds, and I think we're going to be giving September or October away. So put your name in the chat if you're interested. If you do win these leave-behinds, we want you to make sure you send us pictures of you using them. You're out in the field, so please put yes in the chat and we will put your name in the hat at the end.
Speaker 1:Okay, our agenda this month, september, is fall prevention month, so we thought it was going to be this would be a really good topic to talk about falls. So why falls are the number one safety concern for seniors. How home care agencies can help prevent falls, equipping your caregivers with fall prevention skills, marketing and outreach strategies for fall prevention. We have some media campaigns, and then Lisa put together some fabulous September, october and November leave-behinds that she'll review. Okay, all right, so we know falls. That's how we get a lot of our clients.
Speaker 1:Unfortunately, falls are one of the number one safety concerns for seniors. One in four adults over the age of 65 falls each year. Falls are the leading cause of ER visits hospitalizations. 95% of hip fractures are caused by falls. As we age, we fall, we do stupid things. I try and catch myself every time I'm going up and down the stairs, because I'm getting a little older here, but I always think I talk to friends that fall and it's always these freak accidents. But as we age and we fall, things break. Home care is the frontline solution to preventing falls, protecting seniors and reducing hospitalizations. So this represents a powerful growth opportunity for agencies prepared to deliver proactive solutions. So fall prevention awareness it's a win-win for clients and agencies. Differentiate your agency. Position your agency, your services, as proactive, safety-focused and trusted. Build referral relationships, hospital rehabs physicians they're eager to partner with agencies that help reduce readmissions. That's a big one Reduce readmissions.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a big buzzword there readmissions. They don't want none of that happening.
Speaker 1:No People fall. They go to rehab, they go to the hospital. They break their hips. They need help when they go home Could be standby assistance. They may have a walker or something new that they're using. So there's a big opportunity for you to work with these referral relationships and let them know that your caregivers can help these patients when they get home and be safe. Increase client retention.
Speaker 1:Families value agencies that help prevent falls, leading to longer care engagements. Train your team. We're going to talk about training your team. Your caregivers need to know, they need to be trained in fall risk awareness prevention. They need to know how to help somebody in and out of a car or if standby assistance. And we're going to talk about training your caregivers because that's important. Some of you have aids licensed aids in your agencies and then there's some non-medical home care that you just have companions. You have to make sure that everybody is trained and you're onboarding to help prevent. You're there to keep the seniors safe at home to help prevent falls or help somebody. Help them, assist them when they get home from recovering from a recent incident.
Speaker 2:I feel like there should be a fall prevention package of some kind. I bet you guys have put together something already here on these slides like a. I sure hope so.
Speaker 1:Here we go. Oh good, we put a checklist together and everything Awesome.
Speaker 2:When we put websites together, we do see that people will offer a fall prevention in-home assessment or in-home consultation or something like that, and I don't know how often people just have somebody come out to do fall prevention assessments. But it is another little thing you can add to your services.
Speaker 3:Yeah, even adding it to your home safety assessment period. I think you just add that into that. Yeah, I think it's a good idea, for sure.
Speaker 1:And just when we are, we do have an assessment. Lisa created a great form for all of you and we're going to get to that. But even if you just getting you in the door, offer a safety assessment, they get to know you. Maybe they don't need your services at this moment and we'll talk about that. Offering it to patients and people that are leaving rehab in the hospital. About that offering it to patients and people that are leaving rehab in the hospital. Use market your expertise, use data stories to demonstrate how your agency helps seniors stay safe and independent. And fall prevention isn't just care. It's a growth strategy, peace of mind for families and it's a growth for agencies. Expand your market, peace of mind for families and it's growth for agencies. Expand your market, like Valerie just said, offering a assessment, offering specialized fall prevention services that appeal to seniors, families, referral partners.
Speaker 1:So many seniors, so many adult children. They're worried about their parents, they're a fall risk. They won't use their walker, they won't use their cane. I can personally attest to that. I have an older sister who was over my house this weekend and she has mobility issues and she's walking out of her car to my house with no walker, no cane. I was like where's your cane? In her son's car. Sometimes they're too proud to use things like that. They're at their full risks.
Speaker 3:I think that's exactly what it is. It's the price factor, and if they see other people their age not using one, they're like but why do I need to?
Speaker 1:And I told her. I said one fall, you break your hip. Yeah, the mean sister. Build trust with families. Position your agency as a safety partner, not just a care provider. You're going to keep their parent, their loved one, safe. You have somebody there to help people in and out of the shower, going up the stairs. There is so much standby assistance. I know when I worked in home care we would get so many clients and many of them needed standby assistance. That's a real big one and if that's how they fall, if they don't have somebody properly helping them. Drive long-term engagement. Families stay longer with agencies that actively help prevent hospitalizations and injuries. You're helping people get out of rehab in the hospital. You're there. The day that they get home, their loved one has somebody to help them and they're not falling two days later because they had nobody to help them. You're helping them stay safe.
Speaker 3:And take that opportunity too to be a resource and see if they need extra things like electric bed or whatever it is, grab bars, et cetera.
Speaker 2:Sometimes it's new for them, sometimes they've never used a walker before it's new to them, and sometimes they just don't understand how to use it or they just leave it at their chair I want to interject a little something that has been brought to my attention multiple times about fall prevention lately, and a lot of you have probably heard of sensi, and I'm not saying it's for everybody. You may or may not want to use it or get involved with it or like it, but it is a listening platform. We have to have it installed in the house, but it doesn't video anybody. It listens. It listens for patterns, it listens for words and it also listens for falls.
Speaker 2:Something like Sensi is. If you look into it, it is a great way to get your foot in the door. If the person is not ready for full-time care but they know the family knows this is coming maybe they just can, or maybe they can only afford four hours a week or eight hours a week divided into two shifts. If that's the case, having something like Sensi that's there all the time can not only help you get your foot in the door. Maybe schedule a few light, a couple of light shifts that aren't too expensive for that person. But you're there now, you're managing the sensei stuff, You're managing the four hour visits and they're going to need more care. This isn't going to go backwards. We get in the doors, Great. And even if it's oh, even if it's being a reseller of I've fallen and I can't get up the pendant, stuff, that kind of thing. So there are little ways that you can add services to the fall prevention, to build trust.
Speaker 1:I could attest to that, valerie, the agency that I worked for. We did use Sensi AI and it's really amazing because if they fall, you get a notification. Maybe somebody can't afford that 24-7 and they're a fall risk, but it's a pretty cool thing when they listen. Sometimes they were worried that people were watching them so you had to let them know. No, we're just listening to you. Yeah, that's awesome. I know we have some agencies that use it that we work with. Yes, stand out from your competitors. A proactive approach to safety. Differentiate your agency in a crowded market. We know we have lots of competitions. Differentiate yourself.
Speaker 1:Deliver true peace of mind. Families know that their loved one is supported, safe and able to stay independent at home. Okay, this is important. When we were putting this program together, lisa and I were talking about this, and it's really true. When somebody falls, there's physical, mental and emotional. It affects seniors. They can break their hip, they bruises, their whole face is black and blue or fracture their wrist. They lose mobility. They may be not able to walk or perform their daily tasks. They're in chronic pain or they fall. They break their hip. They have to have surgery. It may be a long recovery period, it's a higher chance of them needing long-term care or assistive devices. Sometimes they decline in health, sometimes a fall, and I know we all know this. Somebody's doing great, then they have a fall and they go downhill, it just happens, and they can get pneumonia, blood clots, muscle loss. They can also then be afraid of falling, which again can cause further weakness because they're not getting up, they're not moving around, they don't want to shower.
Speaker 3:They don't want to get in the shower because maybe they fell in the shower.
Speaker 1:They don't want to leave their house. Then depression and anxiety comes to play. They're depressed, they don't want to leave their house. It all comes together, and that's how home care could really help.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Having someone standing by with you so that nothing happens. What a great yeah, very encouraging, very comforting.
Speaker 2:I hate to say this, but sometimes, having worked with people in all different capacities, that person is frail and I think you guys have probably seen this at home. I don't want to say it's the beginning of the end, but it's a big fall with a big fracture and that person's already frail. Yeah, it is not gonna end well. It just depends on the family, the person, how healthy they were before they fell and all those other things. But it can really. It can really be tough.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's what I was saying too, and that while we were putting this together, that's all downhill from here a lot of the time, when someone falls and it's bad, but I've seen it a trillion times too yeah, and especially, like valerie said, if they're already deconditioned or they're weak or they have other things going on, it's it really puts them way, way back, sets them way, way back.
Speaker 1:Yeah it does. Okay. So how you can assist, how your agency can assist. You can provide home safety assessments to identify and remove hazards, and in a minute Lisa's going to review this great assessment sheet that she has. We all walked in these homes with the cords all over and throw rugs somebody that maybe hoards. It's important to go through these homes and see what's safe and what's a deterrent for them. Personalized care plans tailored to mobility and risk level, supervision, assistance with walking transfers, daily tasks. We know many of our clients need this help. Many Assistance taking a shower, getting in and out of the car, taking them to the doctor's appointments, bringing their garbage out that's a big thing Bringing their garbage out to the driveway and then making the beds.
Speaker 1:Those were always the really two big things that people loved having our caregivers help them with Medication reminders to reduce dizziness or side effects. Supporting with balance to reduce dizziness or side effects. Supporting with balance strength exercises they have many times. Some of your clients have PT exercises. Your caregivers can help them with their exercises, reminding them to do their exercises, getting them up every few hours to walk. They might have a stress ball that they have to use.
Speaker 1:You can provide caregiver training we're going to talk about that in a little bit too for fall prevention techniques, family education on maintaining a safe home environment. So these are all ways you know that you can help and you know, like I said, many of these adult children. They're concerned about their family members being safe and needing the extra assistance. All right, so now we're going to talk about caregiving Again. Like I said in the beginning, you may have some aides that are already trained, but a lot of agencies are more just companions, so they're non-medical. So you want to make sure in your onboarding, when you're hiring new caregivers, that you go over at least the fall prevention basics.
Speaker 1:You want to safety mobility least the fall prevention basics. You want to safely, safety, mobility, proper transfer. You know from bed to chair, standing sitting up, how to properly adjust canes, walkers, wheelchairs. How many times have you gone to a? I know this happened to me once I had a walker. I was trying to figure out how do I adjust this, how do I make this? They have to know how to do that. Gate belts some yeah, I didn't work with gate belts, I think you did, lisa right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I still have a couple in my car, which is crazy. They're still just right there ready to go, just in case.
Speaker 1:But you know, spotting the seniors, the home and the environment like walking through, removing the rugs, reducing the clutter, improving lighting Again the cords is a really big thing. Very low furniture. Maybe they have a chair that's really hard to get out of. Changing that chair could make a big difference, or getting them one of those fancy electric chairs to help them get up.
Speaker 2:We had a thing for Charlie's mom that would bring her up, like it was something she sat on, like we put a cushion over it, but it had a spring on it and, boy, when she was ready to get up, that thing it was before we got her the electric thing chair and all that but it would spring her up out of the chair. Now, that might have been more of a fall risk, I don't know, but I sat on it. Yeah, it launched her into the next universe. So I tried it a couple times to see how hard it was like or she could sit on it, but it was nice. It just helps you get up. I don't know how to explain that. You can buy them on Amazon.
Speaker 2:Anyway, that may not be the greatest idea for someone who doesn't have a walker in front of them, though, because it will. It's like the eject button and yeah, so you have to be careful. And also, charlie, we're not super old, but we have a walker. We actually gave away all of our. He's had two surgeries and one was on his foot at some point back years ago, and so we had a walker. We had a knee rolly thing. We have all kinds of assisted living equipment. We had a shower bench. We gave all of it away. And don't do that, don't keep it away, don't.
Speaker 1:Keep it. You never know. You never know you could be young and have a surgery. You want to train them how to respond to falls. This is an important thing. You could have a client and they fall. Stay calm, Keep the client safe. Don't pull them up. Always call the office right away. I could picture myself in the office right now. Scheduler answers the phone. You assess the situation. Sometimes we would call 911 or a family member to pick them up. I know we didn't like our caregivers to pick somebody up right away. So making sure you have that right protocol. If one of your clients falls, what you're supposed to do, Ours we had everybody call the office.
Speaker 3:I don't know, Lisa Well, what do you do if the person's okay? Right, they're okay. So if they can I've done this before have something close to them that they can crawl back up, if they're able to do that. And if they're not, then at least make sure they're comfortable. If you had to call someone to come help them, get them situated, get them their phone Sometimes you have to wait a little while get them a pillow, I don't know waited. Get them their phone. Sometimes you have to wait a little while get them a pillow, I don't know. I've had a couple of those happen. So I wanted to make sure the person was okay while they had to wait to get help batch up, because when you have someone on the floor, it's really hard to get them up if they can't help themselves up and making sure you call that family member, because if the family member calls you three days later and say hey, I heard my mom had a fall, they're not happy about that, that you didn't.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, 100%, 100%.
Speaker 1:And even the mom could have been okay. But I heard my mom, your caregiver, said my mom fell outside the other day. Oh, okay, because they might have been totally fine. But making sure you report it, making sure you document it. It's real important to document in your clients, your CRM or whatever you're using, just so you have everything covered. So definitely responding to falls is a big one. Observation, communication, documenting any changes in walking balance, share concerns with family, the office, making sure your caregivers the caregivers are with your client every day. You're not in there every day. They may have been totally fine. They never needed standby assistance, maybe things are progressing. Make sure that your caregivers know to call the office when they see changes. Let us know. Maybe they're getting more unsteady on their feet, maybe they're on a new medication and they've been dizzy. Making sure that there's really good communication, that that caregiver is sharing it with you and you can share it with the family.
Speaker 3:Right, maybe they're shuffling their feet and they weren't doing that before. Yeah, lots of those different things to watch for.
Speaker 1:Okay, so this is I don't. You may have this in your office. We had a large conference room in the home care agency I worked for and we had a training area. Create a little training area where your caregivers can practice realistic fall prevention, fall response scenarios. Have a walker, have a cane, have gate belts and transfer belts. Transfer demonstrate how they should transfer non-slip socks, shoes. Have a baby baby, it's to practice how to save the baby falls on the floor.
Speaker 2:What are you going to do?
Speaker 1:Don't bend over and pick it up, but having a little area and I'm sure most of you do when you're onboarding. Some of your caregivers may have never used any of this stuff. Making sure that you review these are common things that you're going to be using helping your clients onboarding. Some of your caregivers may have never used any of this stuff.
Speaker 2:Making sure that review these are common things that you're going to be using, helping your clients. I think the gate belt training for those of you who only do companion care and you're not required they're not required to have any major. Maybe everybody teaches this, but I think the gate belt training is so needed.
Speaker 2:They don't already know how to do it because they will kill their backs trying to get people up oh yeah, that's speaking from a nurse saved me from my back is ruined from not caring when I was 20 years old about how heavy someone was and getting them up. I weighed up about 20 years so true getting a 200 pound man up for whatever reason and not caring about my back. And now it's news. So yeah, absolutely Teach those caregivers for their own safety.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Totally the same, valerie, by the way. I used to be like oh yeah, I got you, I can lift you, but Hema says we should have a grabber on that list, and I totally agree with her. Oh yeah, you can't live without those grabbers.
Speaker 1:Get your grabber Clients from bending down. It's yeah Genius. Yep, we should have one in my house. My husband had a hip replacement.
Speaker 2:I still use it these days he had a couple of years ago. I just use it to pinch people in our house.
Speaker 1:So partner with a PT office. Why partner with a PT office? It's a no brainer. Have you may have in quarterly in services, I'm sure you do with your caregivers. Trainer have you may have in quarterly in services, I'm sure you do with your caregivers. Contact a physical therapist and have them come and do show them the mechanics of transferring and fall prevention. I know we did this when I worked in home care and it was so informative. They generally you must know some physical therapists they do this for free. We used to give them a nice little gift card to come and do it for our staff and they appreciated it because we would give them referrals and vice versa.
Speaker 1:But I think if you can partner with a PT office and have them come to an in-service and train your caregivers, it's awesome because we can only do so much. But it's nice to have them learn, have hands-on training from somebody who's experienced, even maybe taking them out to a car or out in the parking lot and showing how to get somebody in and out of the car. That's an important thing too. Sometimes you have clients that really can't get in those high SUVs. You might need a little step for that. But I think it's real-time training when you have somebody from a physical therapist's office. Lisa, did you do that? I know we always did. We did actually we had someone physical therapist we did actually.
Speaker 3:We had someone to come in and show body mechanics. They would even take us down to the car and do getting in safely, getting out safely. We also had someone who did like a hospice 101 type of thing, and so we had lots of different people come in. I think it's the first two weeks when someone, when an admin, starts, and then caregivers too. I don't know. I don't remember how they did that, but, yep, we had someone coming in showing all of that. We also did inter-live training, so we all had to get in and see what it felt like. It was scary actually.
Speaker 2:Did you zoom all over the office and say I'm flying, no, I'm just kidding, don't do that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we weren't allowed to do that, but yeah, that was a little scary, but yeah, we learned all that.
Speaker 1:These physical therapists they generally are really happy to assist you. We never had a problem getting one, but it's so nice and your caregivers really appreciate that kind of training, so I think it's definitely like a no-brainer, definitely.
Speaker 2:I think, having a lot of people drive trucks that are really high up or SUVs. We had a. I know it's not weird, but as a family I have triplets, so there were five of us and three at the same age all the time. So we had a family. We had a church van. I know that's weird, but we didn't use it for a church van, big van, and it was really high to step up for somebody like my older parent or Charlie's mom, whatever. So we had a, we had a step stool, but it wasn't the right. It wasn't the right thing to do, it wasn't good. But anyway, what I'm saying is a lot of people have these bigger trucks or higher up STDs that are a little higher. Having somebody show them how to, or show the caregiver how to get someone in and out of that, that's that would have been amazing for us, because that was really hard getting people in and out of our van and you bring that up, valerie.
Speaker 1:It's helping me to remember. Always. We used to always find out what kind of car our caregiver had and we would put that in their file, because if we had a client that we knew was really tiny and we were going to be taking her to the grocery store appointments, we're not going to put her with someone with a large SUV. So that's really important finding out the length of the car and put that in your employee file, because we would always look at that. It was very helpful because if it's a tiny little lady, it's hard for her to get in that car. These trucks are big. I'm hard to get in them myself. Yeah, all right, all right. So now we're going to talk about marketing. So it's fall prevention month for September. That's why we thought this was the perfect time to talk about marketing. So it's fall prevention month for September. That's why we thought this was the perfect time to talk about this. It's fall prevention month. Your agency is offering complimentary in-home safety assessments to help families identify and reduce risks before they lead to injury. You provide on safety evaluations prior to hospital discharge, ensuring a safety and seamless transition to home. Okay, so why? Referral partners love this? You're helping reduce readmissions. You're helping their clients once they get home. Proactive fall prevention lowers hospital returns and it improves patient outcomes. Boost your reputation. They see you as forward-thinking, safety-focused and invested in long-term wellness, and you're protecting their patients to help seniors stay safe, independent and thriving at home longer. So this is it's a good month to talk about it. Position your agency as the fall prevention expert, using language like. We specialize in helping seniors stay safe and reduce fall risks. Promote standby assistance as a core service. Standby assistance is big. I know we have many clients and many inquiries for help for their family members. They needed that standby assistance. Talk about that. Let them know that you can provide standby assistance. Highlight the daily support families value the most Safe walking, helping in and out of showers, transfers. Emphasize your smooth hospital-to-home transition. Showcase on-site safety assessments hands-on support that reduce the readmissions. Spotlight your role in protecting independence. Show referral sources and families how proactive fall prevention helps seniors remain safe at home. And then showcase your value to referral partners. Position yourself as the go-to safety resource that improves outcomes and strengthens reputations. So much you can do for your referral sources, and we have. We're going to Lisa's going to go over it in a little bit, but we include a ring of fall prevention checklist branded with your agency brochure, with some little socks, some nightlights offering your referral sources the free safety assessments. Have a flyer that we're going to show you in a little bit that they can distribute to their patients and families. Pass them out to all their patient rooms, to all the short-term rehab. The families are going to see your flyer. Wow, they're offering free safety assessments. Maybe they don't need your services right now, but you can at least get in the home, do a safety assessment, check their home out. Maybe once you go to their home and talk to them they'll think gee, maybe we should hire them. Maybe we can have mom or dad, maybe we can have you help mom or dad for a few weeks as they're recovering Post lunch and learns.
Speaker 1:Provide a shortened service on fall prevention and skilled nursing facilities, big social workers, case managers, pt, ot staff or assisted living teams. Many times in the assisted living a lot of their residents need some assistance and standby assistance if they're coming home from a recent deficit or if they just got out of the hospital. Sometimes something happens where they just get their fall risk and they need more assistance. Share success stories. Demonstrate how your caregivers prevent falls and reduce readmissions for other referred clients. And always dropping off those fun seasonal treats that we're going to go over in a little while Pumpkin spice coffee, pumpkin bread, apple cider tea packets. Pair with a note Happy Fall Prevention Month. Together we keep our seniors safe. Lisa's going to share all her fun fall things. Yeah, happy fall y'all. Happy fall Direct to family referrals, referral sources, again, with the flyers they can just distribute, even to independent living.
Speaker 1:You could bring these fall flyers. They can put them in their mailboxes. You can go check their apartments out. Can't tell you how many apartments that I would walk in and independent livings and it would be like a crowded mess of stuff. They sometimes had things piled up on their stove or you just walk in and you have a little pathway. They just stuffed their whole house in a one-bedroom apartment. They just couldn't. They had to bring everything with them, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Community outreach and partnerships Again, partner with a PT rehab hospitals, senior centers, co-host with them. They have fall prevention workshops, safety events. Go to churches, libraries, independent living, assisted living communities and offer educational talks. Let them know how you can help their seniors, their patients, with standby assistance, how you help them, keep them safe at home. The lunch and learns and services are so important. We talk a lot about this in sales training. That's when you have that one-on-one opportunity to talk to your referral sources. We have some topics are empowering families with fall prevention tools, big lowering hospital readmissions through home care support, extending your expertise with caregiver training and ongoing support. There's so much you could talk about and we last Mastery Circle.
Speaker 1:We talked about how you have September and October. These are your two months to really get out there and book these Lunch and Learns, book these in services, because what happens after October? We have Thanksgiving, we have Christmas. So the next two months you've got to book all these. This is the perfect time, because you're going to call them in November and December and they're going to say, oh, everybody's on vacation or we're off for the holidays. So this is your time to get out there and let them know what you do. Okay, do we have any questions? I didn't ask Lisa anybody ask any questions.
Speaker 3:There was one thing, though, that Carla Carla said that she is a sensei. If anyone has any questions about the experience, they can email her, and she did include her email here in the chat. If anybody wants to know a little bit more about sensei, she's offered her email up to you and you can pick her brain. Great.
Speaker 2:They've done a lot of in-services. They've done a lot of videos. So if you search for them on YouTube or go to their website, I'm sure you can find a lot of really good information. And they're not the only one. They're not the only service out there. They're not the only game in town. They just happen to be the latest and greatest, that is, at all the conferences and doing a good job of getting the word out about the shows.
Speaker 1:So September and October there's tons of health fairs.
Speaker 3:There's tons of senior expos right.
Speaker 1:So look in your calendar, look in your community calendar. They offer fall risk screenings and home assessments, giveaway flashlights, nightlights, non-slip socks. Sometimes they only allow a certain amount of agencies to come to these events. So make sure you give them a call and say, hey, can I be a vendor? I'd love to be there. You could do exercise demonstrations or maybe sponsor or host a chair yoga at an assisted living or independent living. They may have that. The activities person may already have that scheduled, but you can sponsor it. Bring something healthy for them to eat. Do a little talk. Hey, if you ever need some extra care, let them know what you offer.
Speaker 1:Collaborate with a senior community by sponsoring one of their events. These activity directors have exercise classes, yoga, some have swimming pools. They do all. They attract active seniors. But sponsor one of their activities. It's easy to do. You just really say I'll bring some food, I'll bring a little treat. Then you could bring your fall prevention flyer. Also, pharmacies Talk to them about being your go-to partner. Many times there's independent pharmacies that will let you leave their flyers. There's a lot of the big box like CVS and Walgreens, but I know here, where I am, in upstate, we have a lot of private small pharmacies and they love to have those flyers.
Speaker 3:Okay, yes, had a couple of those too.
Speaker 1:So I'm going to have Lisa take over. She made, she created this wonderful fall prevention home assessment and I'm going to open it up. We have, we're going to send you all the. We're going to send you these PDFs with the links. But I opened it up here, lisa, so we can see it a little bit better.
Speaker 3:I see a little bit Cool, so I mean it is. You can bring this out while you're doing your home safety assessment. It goes through a whole bunch of it. Just goes through the house really, so like floors and pathways. So you're looking at all these different things. You're looking at the lighting. Is everything lit enough to where you know that someone's not going to trip and fall? They're not going to wake up in the dark and just start wandering and bump into a wall or fall. The stairs, are the handrails okay on both sides? Are they lit? Are they not slippery? And then here's something that I threw in there because I remember a time when I had to consider does it really make sense to be using these stairs every day? This person is not going to be able to go up and down and the restrooms down here, and there's nothing up there but their bedroom. Are we going to need to set up shop here for a while, down in the living room or the den? Those are the types of things that you're going to need to be able to answer. They've got to be safe, especially if you're getting not especially, but if you're getting these from one of your referral partners. You really got to make sure that you're dotting your I's and crossing your T's when it comes to the safety and coming up with being proactive and coming up with a way to keep this person safe.
Speaker 3:Bathroom lots of falls happen in the bathroom. Want to make sure that there's grab bars and slide boards or benches maybe not a chair maybe a shower chair isn't good enough but a bench so they can slide all the way into the area. A raised seat or a commode, depending on how high is that seat Things that sometimes you don't even think about. That's a really low seat. How are you going to get down safely and how are you going to stand up safely? So, thinking of those little things the bedroom there's a lot of carpet, there's little throw rugs here and there. Living room this is where the cord situation is usually a big thing and throw rugs, the cords or the living room I don't even know if I mentioned I think I did hoarding situation. So many times have I had to have a hoarding company on deck and get them to be able to come and make it, just so that it was habitable. It was terrible. Lots of homes I've been to like that, where I was okay, my whole day is now over because I have to stay here and make sure this person is safe and wait for the steps to happen, like a hoarding company and other things to happen Living, living area, the kitchen, make sure things are at a level where someone can grab them so I guess hip level or so and the outside?
Speaker 3:We don't even think about the outside. I think a lot of the time, but I need to know is there a step down? Is there a step up? Is there condensation? Does it get really wet out there? I had one time this lady, poor thing. She sat on her patio furniture and when she stood up it ripped so much of her skin on her leg off and it was just horrible. You wouldn't have even thought about it. But is that stuff? Okay? It wasn't a fault. But anyways, the garage, the laundry room, and are they using their? But anyways, the garage, the laundry room, and are they using their walker? Do they have one? Where is it? Do they have issues with using it and keeping that stuff close by? So this is just a guide for you guys, to help you so that you can eliminate some of these falls, or all falls actually.
Speaker 3:We want to eliminate all of them and for those of us that live in the cold weather.
Speaker 1:I know, lisa, you don't but oh, black ice, right, we pick up ice, so we used to always give our caregivers. We used to use kitty litter, but we would fill these cute little bottles and they'd come and pick them up in the office, because sometimes they don't the clients don't have salt or something to sprinkle on the ice, so that's a big thing too. You have to make sure it's safe for your caregiver and your client. That's something we used to look at when we did assessments.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mentioned the condensation outside because I've actually fell pretty hard. One time I just kind of slid across and outside because it was like it was wet and it was just algae was growing and it's just. We're close to the beach, so it's just. It stays that way sometimes and, yeah, that hurt. If I would hit my head I probably would have died. I hit really hard. But you guys can use this. You can change and you can add the date, the client name, address and who completed it, if you needed to. You want to put this in their paperwork and you can change out the logo too. Even if you left this behind for the family or something like that, you could do that as well. I think this really helps show people that you're serious about being proactive and that you want to do everything in your power to make sure that this person hasn't fallen, doesn't fall again or never does that's awesome.
Speaker 1:All right, Lisa, you're going to review some media campaigns, yeah, media campaigns, fall prevention.
Speaker 3:So if you don't talk about it, people aren't going to know about it, right, so you have to talk about it everywhere. So here we can do like a tip of the day or the week on socials you can do this anywhere really but sharing safety tips, exercise demos, caregiver advice, having like real caregivers and things talk would be really cool. Or just having their experiences, share success stories With standby assistance. Mrs Jones hasn't had a fall in six months or ever. She's never fallen because we've been next to her this whole time taking care of her. Short videos, a caregiver demo, how to enter a shower safely this is huge. We used to sometimes go to a rehab or a SNF trying to bring someone home and go and actually record different things that were happening as far as the PT and how we needed to do certain things with this person, just to be able to show the caregiver. I'm invested in this too, because I sat there and did it with them and I recorded it for you. All these little videos would be really helpful Removing hazards, helping a client into the care I think it was car into the car, whatever Helping the client in and out of the car safely without dropping them, hitting their head.
Speaker 3:There's lots of things that could happen there, because it's an odd space that you're in and you're picking them up and helping them move, but you're not picking them up. We're not allowed to say that. And then family tips. So like rearranging furniture, that one is a hard one actually to get someone to roll up their favorite throw rug or many other things. So definitely, choosing safe footwear. I think if you go into those things confidently, not like you're asking a question, can we move this, but we've got to move this. I think that's really helpful in that.
Speaker 1:Absolutely no flip-flops. We had a friend who was walking around with flip-flops. She loved her flip-flops.
Speaker 3:So here's just an idea. So again, like I said, if you don't talk about it, if you don't toot your own horn, people aren't going to know about it. So this is on their website. This is a story or an article on their blog that talks all about fall prevention, and then it's just it's opened up here so you can see the whole thing. But that lives on their website, so forever because it's online. So this is really great and all the detail within this story. Someone could definitely type in something that's here and it would pull this article up for them in that area.
Speaker 3:Okay, next slide. So here's a really cool one. You might recognize this lady over here. But this, this is our Care Across America. It's a interview style video that we do, or that Valerie does, with different owners, marketers and anyone who really wants to talk about that their home care, the home care space and why they do what they do.
Speaker 3:But I just I liked that this talked about safety, not necessarily fall prevention, but safety and so he's talking about it here and then the little text over here live in their home safely. So that's why I screenshot that and just he's talking about it. So it exists now. It exists online. He's talking about safety, and maybe there was some fall prevention he was talking about too, but you got to talk about it. If you want people to know about it, okay, google business profile. So, as you can see, this is like all these things going cross platform, right. So if you look down into the little right on that first screenshot, you see that same fall prevention story right there. So you're pushing it out to everywhere that you can. It's also in this newsletter here, as you can see. So really getting the word out about fall prevention, letting people know that you are an expert and you understand that preventing falls is key.
Speaker 3:And this one here. This is some branded images and I just wanted to show you guys that within this space here, the first one talking about 24-hour home care, and one of the bullets here is we're making sure that high risk of falling. We're there. That's exactly why you have this 24-hour home care. This is why you called us how to choose the right dementia care. Again, what do you see? Safety and supervision. You're talking about it. You're letting people know, You're branding yourself with these things this one key services offered in-home memory care and you see again, home safety and fall prevention. So, constantly letting people know that this is what you do and you have to speak about it again or it doesn't exist. And you have to keep telling people because they're going to pick little pieces of what you say each time and go oh, you do this, Okay, you do this. So it's good to have a conversation and we all have the 24 hour clients.
Speaker 1:We know that's our bread and butter, so the elusive.
Speaker 3:someone told me the other day I'm doing all this. The elusive 24-7 hasn't come yet, but I got a this and a this. They're coming, don't worry.
Speaker 1:They're there All right. Here we are with our fabulous September leave behind, and it's hard to believe next week is September, but this we want you to go out there and really promote this. Lisa tell them a little bit about it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this, and I'm going to probably read a little bit kind of word for word, but the idea behind this one is to you can find it took your notes away, though. No, it's okay, that's okay.
Speaker 1:You want to read the notes first, and then I'll open it Okay.
Speaker 3:There we go.
Speaker 3:The idea is to be able to get to the social worker and get them to come out and speak with you about how you're going to tell them how home care supports them, their patients upon discharge, with fall prevention tips, and then you can say this fall prevention awareness month, but there's some tips on the top here and then, if they wanted to basically send this out either, you could do a stack of these and leave them for folks, but I would definitely want to use this as really before people go home.
Speaker 3:But if that's not going to happen, then at least they can take this home with them in their discharge packages, because this has your logo and information to contact you. So it'd be nice to be able to do that. But I have here try to say something like this I have something to share with you, your staff, and something special for families and patients to take home to help prevent falls in the home, with these 10 practical tips, and then a lot of these tips. Here are that checklist has a lot of this stuff in there too, which you're actually making sure that these things are happening, and then go from there. I would love to be able to have you guys just ask for the kind of assessment while they're, before they get home, before they discharge. But again, you can send this home with them too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and one thing I want to add. We in our sales training, we always try to. We want our marketers, or whoever's out there marketing, get a face-to-face. These flyers are great to get a face-to-face. Because you're stopping at a community, you're stopping at a rehab hey, I've got some fall prevention tips. I have 20 of them. Pass them out to your residents, pass them out to your patients, but it gets them to come out and talk to you. So this is a perfect opportunity to stop everywhere and drop these off. They might put them in the independent residents' mailboxes, they might put them in the lobby of the skilled nursing facility or the community that you're visiting, and it has your logo and your phone number. So this is a perfect opportunity. We're going to send you these. You've got the Google Doc. This is what it looks like, a little bit bigger.
Speaker 1:You've got your logo your phone number, so I love this, and then to pair it. Pair with it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, these socks here. I think there's still time to get your logo put on these bad boys. I know that Dawn Fiala used them and she put the logo on the, I think, at the top of the foot. So, like at the toes, you can wrap a sock with this twine and one of these little fall leaves, get it fall and fall. And then, if you look at the bottom left hand where it says marketing store, if you click there, it's going to lead you to a link to where you could buy these and you don't have to use our link. We just wanted to do all the legwork for you so you don't have to go and shun. So if you click there, you can find all this stuff here.
Speaker 1:And 39 of them for $0.92 each. You put a little ribbon and your little leaf you're good to go, all right, your little leaf, you're good to go, all right. Before we get into the, the leave behinds, we just want to remember, remind everybody that we have our 90-day sales training and we do have openings for our september 10th and september 23rd class. I know I see a lot of our class members here, but if you have any information or need any more information, reach out to me. It's a 12-week course. It's a one-hour week via Zoom. By week six, a lot of our participants are getting referrals. We teach you boots on the ground what to say, what to do. We create leave-behinds for you. We help you with your client relationship. It's awesome. So if you have any questions, let me know. We have the link to give you more information too. It's pretty cool, all right, great. That's it. Thank you everybody for coming. All right, thank you, yeah, and have a great Labor Day weekend.
Speaker 3:We'll see, oh my gosh, yay, bye, you guys, take care, take care.
Speaker 1:Bye-bye.
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