Residents Benefit from New System, It’s Never 2 Late® (IN2L)

Passavant Community residents are touching their way straight to advanced memory support, social connection and personalized content thanks to the resident-centered engagement system – It’s Never 2 Late® (iN2L).

Pennsylvania’s Long-Term Care (LTC) Grant currently funds the project for occupants requiring memory services in the Passavant Community households of Brandywine and Mt. Laurel.

“The goal of the project is to improve quality of life for the residents through personalized, meaningful engagement,” said Laura Roy, executive director at Passavant Community.

“Staff are using it with small groups of residents as well as one-on-one with those who need additional support.”

For Household Coordinators, Tonya Kennedy and Carrie Henderson, the results are amazing.

“What I like most is that it’s connecting them to real life,” Kennedy said.

“In the past, we would retrieve memories from individual conversations,” Henderson added. “But this system allows us to do more.”

From virtual travel to flight simulators and everything in between, ‘Tilly’, – a nickname bestowed upon the system by residents and staff – is preserving the health and well-being of older adults.

“The session usually starts with a video, and then it turns into ‘Oh, I use to live on this road,’ or ‘My husband and I use to square dance all the time’,” Henderson said.

“So, it really does help them remember,” Kennedy added.

The computer system has even assisted staff during incidents of late-day confusion.

“We have a resident who struggles with sun-downing, and we actually calmed her down a few times using the system because she could see her son on video,” Kennedy said.

Staff also encourages family members to immerse themselves in the system by sharing photographs on residents’ private pages.

“The goal is for each person to eventually have a story tab that will consist of photos and videos we’ve asked family to upload,” Kennedy said.

As for the future, Kennedy and Henderson see potential.

“Our hope would be for it to branch out to surrounding floors, outpatient therapy and daily exercise groups,” Kennedy said.

For now, the system will stay between the two memory households while residents participate in assessments twice a week.

The seniors are only required to connect with iN2L® for 15 minutes each day, but it doesn’t seem like that will be much of an issue moving forward with many residents expecting the promise of tomorrow’s game before they’ll sign off.