Tony skinner 00:01
Hi, and welcome to podcast my business podcast channel www.podcastmybusiness.com.au And today we’ve got Allison joining us from www.careapp.com.au. How are you, Allison?
Allison 00:23
I’m super well, Tony, how are you? 
Tony skinner 00:26
I am awesome. We’re both in states where we can go freely about our business. You’re in Adelaide, and I’m in Sydney. And I feel sorry for people in Melbourne. But hey, what do you do?
Allison 00:38
Our thoughts are with them. And yes, we’re incredibly lucky. But our thoughts are with our Melbourne friends. Hopefully, they will see some freedom sometime soon.
Tony skinner 00:47
Yeah, absolutely. And the thing about you, you’ve got the careapp, which is for care homes, and so forth, and nursing homes and those who are residing in them, which the whole thing has been a major challenge, right across the board, and especially enrollment as well. So how does the app help?
Allison 01:11
Yes my Careapp is has been likened to age Care’s answer to some of the childcare or school applications that parents use to stay connected with what’s happening with their kids at school. So much in the same way they operate care homes, and the staff within the care homes can upload photos, videos, newsletters, event schedules, and even documents and links. And that can be shared with family and it provides family we, you know, a reassuring window into what’s happening with their loved ones inside the nursing homes, and especially right now when they can’t be there or visiting as often it’s such a critical piece for all people involved in the care and support of our senior citizens.
Tony skinner 02:02
Yeah, and I think that’s really important what you just said about, because we can’t visit them as much and what have you. And an app is the way that people work these days. And I’ve done a quite a bit of work in the Age care sector, and it’s not those who are in the age care, homes themselves, that are the clients for this sort of product.
Allison 02:27
Yeah, you’re absolutely right. So there’s nothing preventing a resident or senior, you know, using an actively engaging with Kara. But right now, and typically we work with lifestyle coordinators, care workers, and more recently, actually, Allied Health teams and nursing staff as the primary users of the application, and which they will then I use to communicate directly with them with family members.
Tony skinner 02:59
Okay, so you say it uploads videos and so forth? And is it like a, I guess, explained to people in the homes it’s like a modern scrapbook type thing?
Allison 03:11
Yeah, see, careapp works on a number of levels, you can work at an individual resident level, so you can provide content relating to a particular resident, and it could be anything from a quick little wellbeing check to say, Yep, Betty is great today. She’s just had some hairdressing. And, or it might be the vet has just done some podiatry, she’s had a medication had a shower. So it can be just a quick whirlwind check that takes no more than about five seconds to do through to uploading photos or 92nd videos, and actually just like zoom or FaceTime, we’ve got live video chat now as well within careapp, and so family members can connect in real time with their loved ones inside nursing homes. And very, very shortly, we will be releasing a new feature which will enable family members to have access to select documents and links which are in line with the new quality standards around families being actively involved in that care and support process.
Tony skinner 04:19
Yeah, I know that families frequently feel cut off from the entire process and want to know more about what’s going on. Especially when most places around Australia. Getting into see your relatives and what have you in a aged care home is pretty much impossible at the moment.
Allison 04:36
It is and it’s you know, um, for me like care I’ve existed long before COVID and actually came about from when my family wanted to be active contributors to my grandparents care. So my family live in Adelaide and my grandparents lived in avalon. And my mom being the eldest daughter was kind of the care coordinator for the family and me being the one health care provider. When the family was often involved in some of the more medical and well being care and support for my grandparents, and even though we wanted to be active contributors, even though we pick up the phone to speak with the nursing home, we found that we had and what she lacked visibility on how they’re going.
So sometimes we kind of got a bit of a sense of how granddad’s alternating wound was going or dealing with some of the challenges of their hearing aid battery. But as a family, we didn’t actually know granddad was attending happy hour on Friday afternoons and getting on the light beers. And we didn’t know that he became the Mr. Fixit, man around the nursing home and putting his past experience at Ford motors and his skills with tools and fixing things to good use. So when I was able to share that with my mom, it completely changed her view. So where, you know, sometimes it’s not just visiting restrictions, but just geography or busy lives that prevent us from being as present in homes as we would like to be. Hmm,
Tony skinner 06:03
yeah. And that’s exactly right. So we can move past the event as I started off calling it. So what about the residents themselves, I mean, is it straightforward for them to use just on a mobile device,
Allison 06:18
careapp is so simple, and it’s really pretty, is a really pretty application, we’ve got one button right in the middle of the screen down the bottom, which has an orange circle with a plus sign. And if you want to add any content, all you need to do is tap on that orange plus sign, and then carrot will step you through the rest of the process. So once you know that the orange, you know, circle, the big fat orange circle in the middle of the screen is how you create content. And careapp will do the rest for you by guiding you through the next steps.
So it really is quite simple and intuitive, and easy to use. It’s taken us three years, though, to get to this point and working with an alongside of our customers every step of the way. So and I don’t mean customers just in the sense of the aged care providers, but the care workers themselves the lifestyle coordinators, or as we call them, the joy makers, as well as families and friends and the seniors themselves. 
Tony skinner 07:16
Yeah, I mean, again, they’ve got to keep it simple for seniors. I’ve got your website in front of me here, I can see the circle with a plus sign. And yeah, I guess maybe some of their posts are going to be well, God granddad, I didn’t want to know that. I didn’t want to see that. But hey, I guess that happens as well.
Allison 07:35
Oh, absolutely. We do have in careapp, a moderating capabilities. So that is the capacity for content to be, you know, reviewed before it’s shared to ensure appropriateness of the content. And something people always wonder about is around privacy and data security, and to the two of them a slightly different things. So privacy is around ensuring the right information is seen by the right people. And you know, we we’ve actually gone above and beyond with some of our privacy controls in careapp, that are really unique to us. And you won’t see them in any other platforms, right down to how content is created in terms of media, as well as who sees that content and where it can go once it’s been uploaded. And then of course, around data security and data integrity. And we’ve gone through the process of you know, cyber security audits, and of course, all of our data is held onshore here in Adelaide in Australia.
Tony skinner 08:37
Ah, that’s fantastic. Because I guess if some companies do everything in the cloud, you don’t know where it’s gonna go. And where it’s gone. So that’s pretty good. Yeah.
Allison 08:47
Yeah, absolutely. And all about development is actually done here in Australia as well, right here. in Adelaide, our whole development team is I’m very, very fortunate to be surrounded by such talent. And we’re all based in the heart of the Adelaide CBD.
Tony skinner 09:05
Wow, okay. I’m in Sydney and we all think about Adelaide in certain ways here.
Allison 09:18
absolutely absolutely. Your Sydney, Sydney siders are welcome to Adelaide. Anytime I promise, we’ll show you an amazing time with our beaches, our wines and our talents.
Tony skinner 09:28
Well, we can go there now. So there you go. It’s somewhere we can definitely head too. And okay, so this is providing a safety element like if the relative is injured or whatever, and they can press on the plus circle and get help or assistance or anything like that.
Allison 09:48
No, we wouldn’t. You wouldn’t refer to careapp as a, you know, an alert device or safety device. So there are some systems around that offered That support. So whether it be you know, something that they wear around their neck or whether it would be sensors that are placed in and around the home, and actually, ironically, in my own home, and because I’m always testing and trialing new things, I’ve got a bunch of sensors set up around my home at the moment looking at the role it plays in supporting people to say safe and well and live their best lives as they age. So there are systems that are available out there for that care is not that one.
Tony skinner 10:32
That’s cool, good. So it’s a great way of just recording and sharing information. So it’s not the elderly Tinder.
Allison 10:43
What a great idea. We’re always looking for new, you know, stretch targets for development. But no, it’s not a matchmaking service for elderly people. It is very much about providing families with a reassuring window into the care and well being of their loved ones. Everything from a quick wellbeing check to know that they’ve had a shower being fed attended podiatry or hairdressing through to capturing and sharing those amazing moments that they may otherwise not know about. And also having live video chat or having access to real time access to care plans and support.
Tony skinner 11:19
Fantastic. And one of the things Oh my god, you’re getting so easy. I don’t normally give things up. So easy. But I know you’ve got one right here. And you’ve got a special at the moment. So anybody can join care app for free. While we’re going through these difficult times.
Allison 11:38
Yes, so very careapp was the first to come out of the blocks in March recognizing the difficulty that COVID or Coronavirus, has it was then refer to primarily to the aged care sector. So I used to work in aged care, I’m an occupational therapist, and I really knew and understood the challenges that if you know COVID was to get on our shores and become entrenched in the aged care system, the challenges they would face because we know if the flu or gastro gets inside of home, and the you know, the tsunami of events that occur afterwards. So in that moment, I was actually having a wine at the fringe in Adelaide, it was Sunday afternoon and decided to put out on Twitter that will make careapp free for every age care provider around the country, just just show them that we’ve got them during this really difficult time. And we offer that up until the 30th of September.
And we have just renewed that for providers who didn’t jump on board in that time. So we have more than 200 providers that are 200 organizations that jumped on board during that time. And we for those that didn’t jump on board, and we recognize that the Coronavirus or COVID continues to be, you know, problematic. And we’ve extended that offer for them. So please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at careapp.com.au. 
Tony skinner 13:00
Excellent. And they got is the benefits of jumping on the wine.
Allison 13:04
Absolutely. careapp was born over a glass of wine on a Friday afternoon. So you know there is something to be said for enjoying the the South Australian ones.
Tony skinner 13:15
Of course, because we don’t make wines in a nice box. Actually we do.
Allison 13:26
No, I say yeah, we did that. And it was the response was beyond anything I could have ever dreamed of. And we work with providers every we’re from, you know, small, one facility, family owned organizations to large organizations that are private equity backed or large, not for profits with nearly 50 and residential care sites around Australia. And we’re in every state and territory except for Tasmania and the ACT at this point in time. And the other thing that people should know about characters, we don’t work just in nursing homes. But increasingly we working out in homecare as well. So care workers who visit people in their own homes can use care as a way to and record document capture, share the amazing work that they’re doing and provide families with that same reassurance.
Tony skinner 14:22
Fantastic. Okay, great. All right. Anything else you’d like to share? Allison?
Allison 14:28
Oh, I don’t think so at this stage and we love working with the aged care industry. We’re always learning and you don’t need to be a customer of careapp to or want to be a customer of care to reach out and offer your thoughts your suggestions. careapp has grown from the grassroots. My very first conversation was with a care worker at a coffee shop with some sketches on a piece of paper. And that’s the way we continue to develop and grow grow careapp is by working with and alongside the industry. So If any of your listeners have any thoughts, ideas, suggestions on how we can continue to support the industry by developing our product I would love to hear.
Tony skinner 15:12
online@careapp.com.au
Allison 15:18
That’s the one.
Tony skinner 15:20
Right. Thanks very much for your time.
Allison 15:23
My pleasure. Thank you.
Tony skinner 15:27
Right thanks