Arasveien Care Center is located at Kjeller outside Oslo, Norway. It has a total of 42 long-term beds for people living with dementia, including a sheltered unit with 12 beds. Arasveien has always used old-fashioned and analog alert and alarm methods, including cowbells (!), as well as regular and planned supervisions day and night.
In May 2024, Arasveien began a proper digital transformation, installing a modern nurse call system from Sensio with RoomMate multi-sensors in all 42 rooms, the Sensio 365 cloud solution and the Sensio Pocket mobile solution, as well as watch or necklace with resident localisation, door sensors and assistance/violence alarms.
Stine Roseth Kleven (pictured) is a Senior Advisor for health centers and institutions in Lillestrom local authority. Right from the start, she felt that Arasveien was more than ready to install new technology and that the care teams were motivated from day one.
"I'm very impressed with the transformation Arasveien has undergone, and it's been great fun to lead this process. There has also been good management support and we have had the right key people involved in the work. It's been such a great success that we've copied this model to other institutions in the area," she says.
Work smarter and more efficiently
Anushathevi Karunakaran (pictured) is a Healthcare Worker and has worked at Arasveien Care Center for 18 years. She is delighted with the introduction of care technology from Sensio, especially all the benefits of digital supervision with Sensio Pocket on her mobile phone.
"The technology is great and the use of digital supervision makes us work much smarter and more efficiently than before. We don't need to disturb residents when they don't need help, and we save a lot of time that we can spend on those who really need it instead. It makes us feel safer at work, while the residents are also safer," says Karunakaran.
"Watching over" the residents
Hilde Mari Fjellvik (pictured), a Registered Nurse at Arasveien Care Center, highlights residents' right to privacy as one of the major benefits of the RoomMate sensor and digital supervision.
"We tend to say that we are not 'watching' the residents, but 'watching over' them – they can have their own privacy. We've spent a lot of time setting the alerts and alarms on RoomMate and optimising them for each individual resident. This means that they are not disturbed unless they need assistance," says Fjellvik.
She says that the benefits have been particularly great for the care teams at night.
"When we use digital supervision at night, we avoid waking residents unnecessarily. The care teams at night carry out planned or alarmed digital supervisions without disturbing the resident's sleep. This has led to quieter and more efficient nights for the care teams and better sleep for residents. Data from Insight also complements the night teams' own observations in a very good way.
Receiving objective data with Insight
In November 2024, Arasveien Care Center became a pilot customer for the Sensio Insight e-health solution after seeing the benefits Skedsmotun Care Center gained from this tool. The starting point for Sensio Insight is that alarms and data from connected sensors, primarily from the RoomMate multi-sensor, are used to collect and present data-driven insights about the residents. In record time, Arasveien has come the furthest in the Lillestrom area in the use of technology and data.
"Arasveien was quick to adopt Insight, and even though they already had a lot of new technology to deal with, it's impressive to see how quickly they saw the benefits of this tool. It's also the first institution in the area where the doctor has also adopted Insight," says Stine Roseth Kleven at Lillestrom local authority.
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Using Insight for mapping
At Arasveien, Sensio Insight is activated on all 42 residents, so they can use it to get measurable and objective data when needed.
"In practice, we use Insight on the residents who need mapping for a reason. This could be daytime activity and/or sleep patterns at night, and being able to go back in time to analyse longer periods is a great advantage," says Registered Nurse Hilde Mari Fjellvik.
Hilde Mari Fjellvik and Anushathevi Karunakaran work with Sensio Insight at Arasveien Care Center (the PC screen is manipulated).
She explains that the doctor at the sheltered unit also uses the data from Insight as a decision-making tool for medication, for example when adjusting medicine doses or starting new medicines. In addition, they use Sensio Insight actively in dialogue with relatives.
"In the past, there could be a lot of 'opinions' and 'feelings' when it came to resident behavior and sleep patterns. Now we have objective and precise data that can also be used in dialogue with relatives. It's great to be able to confirm or refute claims and opinions about a resident, and thus be able to implement the right measures if necessary," explains Hilde Mari Fjellvik.
Providing more person-centered care
Hilde Mari Fjellvik emphasises that the most important benefit of Sensio Insight and data-driven insights is the awareness that each resident is an individual with a unique care need. She and colleague Anushathevi Karunakaran, who is also a Sensio Insight super user, have several concrete examples of how the use of objective data for resident mapping can provide both better and more person-centered care.
- One resident had problems sleeping and was given medication. The data from Insight over time showed that the sleeping medication was correctly dosed and that it worked as intended so that the resident slept better and longer.
- A resident was diagnosed with a urinary tract infection, and with the help of Insight data going back in time, noticeable changes could be seen in sleep patterns, toilet visits and daytime activity. This learning means that urinary tract infections can now be detected much earlier in other residents.
- One resident often visited the room next door, which made the visitor very anxious. They moved the resident to another unit with good results, and with the help of objective data from Insight, they were able to justify the move to the relatives.
Wants everyone to use Insight
Hilde Mari Fjellvik envisions that Sensio Insight will eventually be made available to all employees at Arasveien Care Center.
"We will continue to use data from Sensio Insight as needed, but I imagine that both the primary contacts for the residents and all the doctors at Arasveien will be able to make use of the data. The more you use this tool, the better you become at interpreting the information," she says.
Fjellvik believes that other local authorities should look forward to using Sensio Insight.
"Implementing and using modern care technology to improve care for residents and the working day for employees, while at the same time saving money in the long run, is something all local authorities should prioritise. The fact that we can use objective data for resident mapping, instead of 'feeling' and 'opinions', will make a big difference in the care service in the future and be of great benefit to residents, care teams and relatives," she concludes.
Photo of cowbells: Lillestrom local authority.
