The Anatomy of Change The Anatomy of Change - LeadingAge

A Partnership Centralizes and
Streamlines Senior Services
Several years ago, the leaders of Porter Hills Retirement Communities
and Services, Grand Rapids, Mich., decided to launch
a Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE). It
sounds simple enough, but for one large roadblock: The only
building Porter Hills could find to house the program was an
empty grocery store measuring 37,000 square feet. And that
was 20,000 square feet more than Porter Hills could use.
They realized that with the right partnerships, that roadblock
could be a huge boost to the older residents of Muskegon
County.
“This ended up being two levels of collaboration,” says Life-
Circles PACE Executive Director Bob Mills. “The building
partnership started with the idea that we found a space that
was ideal for the PACE but was too large for us. And the other
happened when we found partners and created this continuum
of care for very healthy seniors to those who are frail.”
Porter Hills put out the call to area organizations with
similar missions—to serve seniors—to share the building,
and wound up with three partners. Since 2008, the PACE has
shared the building with the Area Agency on Aging (AAA),
Agewell Services, which provides everything from Meals on
Wheels to art and fitness classes, and “Call 211,” which helps
seniors find resources in the community.
“There were a couple of agencies we had to turn away
because we ran out of space,” says Porter Hills CFO Reed
Vander Slik. “That’s a good problem to have.”
In the beginning, says Vander Slik, there were two main
goals for the partnership: to save costs by combining space and
sharing some staff between the agencies and to pool resources
to better serve seniors. Both have worked well, say the partners,
providing a host of benefits and services to seniors who
walk through the door.
“There’s a very programmatic collaboration that occurs,”
says Mills. “We purchase our dietician time through Agewell,
and they do our meals for us in the PACE program. Senior
resources are critical, and we share an intake counselor. So any
call that comes in where somebody’s looking for counseling,
the counselor can talk with them and get them where they
need to be for services. It’s been an absolutely incredible benefit
for our referral numbers.”
The center has a state Department of Human Services
employee who works on-site who can authorize seniors for
Medicaid benefits. “That normally takes two to three weeks,”
says Mills. “It can occur here within three days, and that can
be critical with cutoff points and intake points.” The DHS bills
the AAA agency for the cost of that employee and then Life-
Circles picks up half of the cost.
Mills says the benefits of the partnership play out every day.
“Last fall, we had a family visit us from out of state whose
frail mother lives here,” he says. “They knew she needed more
help to stay at home independently, so they came into the
building. Within the week—before they left to go home—she
was enrolled to come into [the] PACE and get some other services.
They were able to take care of everything within days of
coming here, and they had no idea when they came in what
they were looking for.”
“Whenever a senior walks through that door, we somehow
meet their needs,” says Vander Slik. “Together, the partners do
a tremendous job of making sure we don’t turn anyone away
without an answer. We always try to put them in touch with
someone who can help. That’s good from a business standpoint,
but also from a community standpoint.”
The four agency directors meet twice a month to go over
details of the partnership and ensure that everyone stays on
the same page moving forward. And it hasn’t all been sunshine
and roses from the start. Vander Slik says designing the space
to meet everyone’s needs was quite challenging, and a consultant
was finally brought in to work out the collaboration’s
details. But the benefits have far outweighed any issues along
the way.
“The benefits of this have been above and beyond what we
thought might happen,” says Vander Slik. “As the senior population
grows, it really makes sense to centralize and be able to get
people to one place where they can find the help they need.”
A Partnership Brings Health
and Wellness to Public Housing
Stephen Fleming, president and CEO of Well Spring Retirement
Community, Greensboro, N.C., says his group always
tried to provide health care services to the seniors it served.
But it wasn’t until the organization partnered with the University
of North Carolina-Greensboro Nursing School and the
Greenville Housing Authority that things really took off and
Fleming felt confident that his residents were getting all the
routine health care they needed.
“The nursing school had a small program at each of our
individual housing authority locations,” he says. “In 2008, we
approached them about the possibility of forming some partnerships,
and that came out of a lunchtime conversation I had
about ways to expand the programs that were already offered.”
He met with the directors of the two programs, a partnership
was forged, and the health care clinics went from
twice-yearly offerings to year-round opportunities to receive
health care services.
“In 2005, we came up with a strategic plan that was updated
in 2008,” he says, noting that he’s getting ready to update it
again this year. “We saw a need to evaluate our services and
expand our opportunities outside of our core continuing care
LeadingAge magazine | March/April 2011 17