Opus Gardens: Doing it Right from the Ground Up—A Case Study

Editor’s Note: In the first issue of TSH , we promised to carry real world stories about how senior housing sites were bringing the benefits of technology to their marketing, operations, staff, and residents. Thanks to the owners of Opus Gardens, TSH has been given a unique opportunity to follow a deployment story from conception, to groundbreaking through Grand Opening. To help our readers understand the many considerations and decisions that go into installing a state-of-the-art technology platform, TSH begins in this issue an on-going series that will include photos and interviews; we call it, Technology from the Ground Up: The Evolving Story of Opus Gardens. Stay tuned and enjoy your ringside seat! In the following post the names have been changed to protect the privacy of the parties.

Located in the town of Tukwila, Washington, just outside Seattle, Opus Gardens will be a multi-building, 151 -unit campus providing both assisted living and Alzheimer’s care. The unusual thing about Opus Gardens is that the owners are dedicated to incorporating a full range of cutting edge technology—hardware and software—in the building before they even break ground. The technology infrastructure will support the building’s day-to-day operations and also ensure complete broadband connectivity to every resident.

Opus Gardens was conceived and designed by Crescent Capital Investment, a development firm with a successful track record developing multi-tenant, multi-unit living spaces. CCI has partnered with a nationally known expert in senior living communities, and together the two make a winning combination that may help usher in a new type of senior housing community.

Several factors led this team to the conclusion that their project needed to incorporate cutting edge technology:

• The increased demands for connectivity on the part of seniors and their family members
• The positive impact broadband (“always on”) connectivity has on the health, well-being and satisfaction of seniors (much as Richard Adler outlines in his study—see “What’s New)
• The operational advantages, cost savings, efficiencies and revenue generating possibilities that come with taking a holistic approach to business operations, resident care, quality of life, and customer satisfaction
• The Ownership’s express desire to make the entire project a showcase for technology
• A regulatory requirement to be fully HIPAA compliant from the start (as detailed in “Hip on HIPAA”)

Some of the many issues that the owners are reviewing before making final decisions include:

• What kind of hardware and software and in what quantities should be provided to support operations and marketing.
• What kind of hardware and clinical systems will support the care staff, including whether such devices should be wireless.
• Outfitting an on-site telemedicine suite with high-speed videoconference capabilities.
• The need for HIPAA compliant software, encryption, and training.
• Video and web conference capabilities for the residents to communicate with friends, family, and healthcare providers.
• The build-out into resident rooms, including an always-on IP-based broadband network, digital television, Internet access, phone lines, video-on-demand services, digital music, and interactive gaming.
• Remote monitoring of residents in the Alzheimer’s unit via web cams and remote monitoring medical devices.
• The creation of an interactive web site that will market Opus Gardens using video, virtual tours, and 360⁰ photos.

The owners hope to use Opus Gardens as a template for creating a chain of senior communities, each of which uses a cutting edge technology platform to improve returns and also make life better and healthier for the residents.

As options are debated and decisions made, we’ll keep you informed so you can see, first hand, one way in which the senior living industry is responding to the collision of those two mega-trends, technology and the aging of America.

Next post we’ll feature more information from the design and specification phase of the Opus Gardens project.
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