One of Glasgow’s largest home care providers is set to trial out a new piece of technology for its staff, with the aim of being able to provide a higher standard of service to residents than previously thought possible.

2500 staff working as home carers have been given smartphones equipped with the CareSafe mobile app; an app set to make helping residents in home care, easier, simpler and more transparent.

Pros and Pros – The CareSafe App

The app provides a number of tools and services for home carers while they are working. Its main focus is on scheduling and time management, as it helps make home visits easy to monitor and manage.

Home carers can ‘check-in’ and ‘check-out’ of homes they visit, which is viewable by a coordinator based in a central hub to see if any visits have been delayed or missed.

To ensure these check-ins are legitimate, they often require the carer in question to scan a QR code belonging to the resident in question in order for the app to register that the resident has been seen to.

If a delay is likely, the home carer in question can use the app to call the resident in advance to let them know ahead of time when they likely arrive.

While delays are sometimes inevitable, the app has Google Maps built into it to allow home carers an easy way to locate and find the houses of residents they need to visit.

The app also has a dedicated section to allow staff to store sensitive information about particular resident’s homes, for example, the pass-code to the gate of a resident’s house.

Benefits to all

Head of Operations for the CareSafe App, Frances McMeeking, said: “The new CareSafe app has been hugely beneficial to the overall service we provide, helping us to deliver a consistently high standard of home care to service users across Glasgow.”

“It will reduce instances of missed appointments, offer navigational help for the team and provide an added level of comfort to both our service users and employees.”

“A team of coordinators can now monitor visits in real-time; quickly checking in with individual members of staff if a visit isn’t made. Equally, our home carers can also phone ahead to say they’ve been subject to a delay, which is something we know service users appreciate.”

Worth the trouble

While the app is only for those requiring home care, it has sparked interest in how apps and technology, in general, could benefit those in other care services, such as senior care or respite care.

And while it took a lot of time and effort to make the app, head of ICT for the app, Brendon Murphy couldn’t be happier with the results:

“Our ICT team spent three months alongside home care employees, working with them to shape the app development to meet their requirements.”

“The end result is an effective and user-friendly piece of tech which will produce major benefits for our home care operation.”