When shelter-in-place took effect, keeping seniors away from their On Lok PACE center, our Activities team decided to take the center to them. “In two short weeks, we shifted from providing in-person activities to home-based and online activities,” says Activity Therapy Specialist Nicholas (Nick) Sager. “Our strategy was to reinvent programs offered at the center and deliver the same quality of services, now into the home.”
Even while isolating, the team uses a high-touch approach that addresses the needs of body, mind and spirit. Over the past few months, in collaboration with their teammates, Activities staff have been making a lot of wellness calls to make sure participants are receiving the care they need and do not feel too isolated and lonely.
“We have been connecting regularly with seniors and families over the phone, screening for all the things we normally check: How is their exercise, their functional and physical condition, their mood? Are they eating right and taking their medication?” Nick says. “We have a very personal relationship with all our participants. We really miss them and worry about their health and well-being.”
Staying connected
Although seniors tell us that they miss the social interaction with peers and staff and their favorite center activities, most feel safer self-isolating at home. To keep them engaged in PACE programming and with one another, the team has created and shared a calendar with links to live streaming activities and prerecorded exercise videos, cooking sessions, brain games and trivia, guided drawing and painting, drumming lessons, English as a second language, and many other activities to boost body, mind and spirit. This calendar is reserved for On Lok PACE participants and designed with each of them in mind.
“Our dance movement program is very popular with seniors, so we created a dance video to help people stay fit at home,” Nick says. “We might also invite people to a cooking activity on Zoom or to a concert of their favorite music, played by our staff. Many seniors are not internet-savvy, so we asked them if they needed help getting set up to view the videos. For seniors who are not online, we telephone and correspond by mail to stay in touch and deliver materials.”
The team has been creating and delivering personalized activities kits, “so that each participant can receive a care package from their Activities team,” Nick says. The kits contain arts and crafts supplies, exercise charts, puzzles, and brainteasers like Sudoku. “We send them CDs and recordings of their favorite songs—it has all been very personalized,” Nick says. “We also create a monthly activities newsletter, one more way to keep the seniors connected to their community.”
Adapting to serve the community
For Activities staff, sheltering in place has also required adjusting, conducting care conferences and online meetings from home. “Under normal circumstances, we would usually meet hundreds of seniors in person every week; now I am at the computer all day,” Nick says. “But we are grateful to see how On Lok came together as an organization and responded to the pandemic so proactively very early on.”
Activities team members say that maintaining a personal connection with seniors inspires everything they do. “Before COVID-19, seniors came to the center not only to get their healthcare needs met, but also for social connections and engaging in activities, and we have made a point of being very personal and informal, as if we were right with them in their home.”
