“The pot’s boiling,” said Barbara Huelat, principal of Huelat Davis, during a roundtable discussion hosted by Environments for Aging magazine and the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID) during the 2019 EFA Expo in Salt Lake City. Huelat’s comments were in response to a question about the future of senior living and if change is happening fast enough. Other participants agreed, noting shifts in home healthcare, multigenerational solutions, and aging boomers are among the issues pushing the industry to look for new solutions and ideas. “The time has come for change,” said Debra Levin, president and CEO of The Center for Health Design.

During the roundtable, moderated by Randy Fiser, CEO of ASID, and Anne DiNardo, executive editor of Environments for Aging magazine, industry leaders discussed a variety of topics from aging boomers to how senior living can extend beyond its communities to the larger neighborhood. So what’s keeping them up at night? One major concern is caregivers, both those working in the home and in senior living communities, and how design can help to deliver needed resources as well as provide opportunities for respite and support. Huelat noted that the population of volunteer caregivers is growing exponentially, with mostly women over the age of 60 filling those roles.

Jane Rohde, principal at JSR Associates, said those issues extend into the senior living workforce, where staff often juggle multiple jobs to make ends meet, which can impact care and lead to increased burnout or dissatisfaction. To address staff shortages, specifically, she shared an example of the city of Tulsa, Okla., which sought to draw tech workers, creatives, and other digital professionals to the city through a special program that offered $10,000 grants to eligible applicants who committed to living there for a year. Rohde suggested that a similar program may be beneficial for recruitment of senior living care givers, as well.

Keith Stanton, director of design development at Thoma-Holec Design LLC, agreed that he sees a need to address staffing needs, especially in memory care, but isn’t seeing many clients doing it. “The sector needs more staffing and a different care environment,” he said.

In addition to staffing, the participants discussed the need to shift the thought process on care and, ultimately, the built environment. Rohde cited a project in Denmark that incorporated a household model with innovation centers where residents had access to physical therapy, occupational therapy, and rehabilitation. Those residents that accessed therapy could do more for themselves, which allowed more aging in place. “How do you allow the senior to be stronger and more independent?” she said.

Moving senior living from a financially driven model to a person-centered model was another change that participants said was necessary. Rhode discussed how most projects are viewed as insulated instead of as part of the larger community. Rethinking the approach to connect development projects to fill in gaps in services and the market would attract “bigger money,” she said.

Judy Newcombe, president of Newcombe Design Associates Inc., said cultural attitudes toward aging also need to be addressed to help drive change, noting that some countries value and respect their older adults more than others. Multigenerational communities were viewed as one solution to help increase interaction between younger and older generations and help increase understanding and empathy toward older adults.

While the issues facing the industry continue to grow in variety and complexity, the roundtable participants said there are plenty of things they’re doing now to help drive change. Rohde’s firm is working to create a new model that would collocate an existing Children’s Home campus serving at-risk youth with a “teaching and research” community focused on older adults receiving care and services. “We’re trying to create a model to show people to get their backing,” she said.

Others noted that they’re looking outside the industry, including to retail and healthcare, for new ideas. “The way we’ve been doing it is leaving lots of holes,” Huelat said. Stanton says his firm is hosting informal focus groups to ask why older adults aren’t moving in. “People want independence,” he said. “So we’re trying to learn what might attract them.”