Q&A
Care England speaks to Tandeep Gill, Head of Business Development (UK and Ireland) at PainChek, to learn how providers can use AI technology to future-proof their business, become more efficient and adopt a more person-centred approach to care.
IN THE HOT SEAT with Tandeep Gill
Care England: Given the increased financial pressures facing providers, why should care providers continue to invest in technology?
Tandeep Gill: I would encourage care providers to think about tech as a tool that they can use to improve efficiency. See it as an investment, rather than a cost. Also, providers shouldn’t underestimate the value it can add in helping them to future-proof their business.
Technology can also help drive productivity and improve job satisfaction, giving carers more time to interact with residents. Care must be person-centred to attract and retain the most passionate and committed workers. It can also enhance overall resident care and satisfaction, leading to valuable word-of-mouth referrals and driving up occupancy by attracting more residents to providers.
The collection of data allows for a broader analysis of the entire care home. Providers will be able to identify what we call the ‘pain burden’ across their entire estate and evaluate how well pain is being managed. This can help avoid the unnecessary moving of residents to high-acuity settings and reduce the level of costly one-to-one care, therefore lessening the need for agency staff.
CE: Can digital transformations result in financial savings?
TG: Yes, absolutely. How much money is saved will depend on the nature of the business, the efficiency of implementation and the specific technologies that are adopted. Artificial Intelligence (AI) can assist, rather than replace, human decision-making and can help remove the need for the workforce to spend time completing mundane tasks. This gives care staff more time to focus on fostering a more person-centred approach.
The Department of Health and Social Care is investing money to support the sector, and we’re hopeful that funding will be available from Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) to accelerate digital adoption. I’d encourage providers to speak to their ICBs, as I think there’s an opportunity for funding there.
CE: How should SMEs go about looking for a credible tech provider to meet their needs?
TG: It’s important to look at the evidence first and to find out whether a claim has been proven and always check the credibility of the research. Consider what problem (or problems) you’re trying to solve and how technology can help. Ask questions, such as:
‘What do we spend most of our time doing?’ and ‘What information are we lacking?’
Choose scalable digital solutions; does the digital solution integrate, and ask: What does the roadmap look like?
Think about whether the tech is easy to use because successful adoption of digital tools relies on that. Providers also need to consider whether the technology complies with regulatory and industry standards and whether it provides robust security features to protect sensitive business data.
CE: How does PainChek differ from the other pain assessment tools that are out there?
TG: There are a number of technological solutions available to care providers. PainChek is a pain assessment system, which incorporates a mobile app, an eLearning product and a digital analytic suite. It’s these three features that help to make PainChek unique.
The technology is used to assess pain levels and captures the facial micro-expressions that are indicative of pain. That’s combined with a pain checklist that covers the voice, body, behaviour, movement, and activity of the resident. The checklist then generates a pain severity score.
Traditional tools may rely on more subjective assessments. These types of methods are often underutilised, due to their subjective nature. For people who are unable to self-report, it becomes difficult to assess, time-consuming and cumbersome, because those assessments aren’t designed to be used at the point of care.
PainChek’s approach to pain assessment can help to remove assessor bias and help simplify the record-keeping process. It’s worth bearing in mind that providers can integrate the tech system with other digital clinical systems, including DSERs (NHS Approved Digital Social Care Records [DSCRs]) - such as PCS, Nourish, Access Care and Clinical, Care Vision and Care Control Systems.
This helps data to move seamlessly between different clinical operating systems to improve accuracy, data integrity and data consistency.
There’s also a data analytic suite, with features for data collection and reporting. This allows providers to collate evidence (for the regulator) and can contribute to a more systemic understanding of pain patterns.
CE: What evidence are you able to share to demonstrate PainChek’s impact?
TG: PainChek has been linked to a 42% reduction in falls, a
42% reduction in what we call ‘stress and distress’ (distressed reactions or behaviour), and a 50% reduction in dependency scores amongst residents after six months, all recently documented in the Scottish Social Care Nurses Network Journal
A recent workshop organised by the CQC as part of their ‘Capturing Innovation to Accelerate Improvement’ project looked at the experiences of Orchard Care Homes. Orchard has adopted PainChek and embedded it into their practices, and it’s helped them deliver high-quality care for their group. Using PainChek, they’ve been able to reduce levels of stress and distress, which has led to a 10% decrease in antipsychotic medication use, across all 23 homes. We’ve written a peerreviewed article about this with Orchard, which has just gone into the Journal of Psychiatry. PainChek has been mapped against all the CQC Quality Statements, and it supports 20 out of 34 of these.
Cheryl Baird, Director of Quality and Care at Orchard Care Homes, said, ‘Managing pain alone is not a silver bullet, but it is important to get this right first, as pain is the most under-recognised symptom experienced by those living with dementia. Whilst we still see slips and trips, the ability to look at potential causes and minimise injury risk has been incredible. A fracture can severely impact an
older person living in care, even reducing life expectancy, so this work is vitally important.’
CE: How much training is involved in using a tech tool such as PainChek?
TG: The change management required for PainChek is minimal. There’s a CPD training programme available, which helps build skills within the tool itself, and helps create a broader understanding of pain and dementia.
A UCL study recently published in the Lancet found that 1.7 million people in England and Wales could be living with dementia by 2040 – that’s over 40% more than previously thought. Given the health and social care workforce is already stretched, we need to take an innovative approach to meeting the needs of this vulnerable group of people, and the use of technology is key to achieving this.
CE: Have you got any workshops or webinars available?
TG: Yes, we have webinars available on our website and there’s a PainChek Academy. Here, providers will find an open portal to e-learning, so anyone can pick up a module and do some training. We also deliver training in-person, directly to carers and residents.
Visit https://painchek.learnworlds. com/ for more information.
Tandeep Gill is the Head of Business Development (UK and Ireland) at PainChek. Email: tandeep.gill@painchek.com @PainChek
