SNAPforSeniors - In the News

Sunday, October 1, 2006

Senior-housing info at a snap

By Marsha King
Seattle Times staff reporter

A Seattle-based Web site launched Friday — SNAPforSeniors.com — aims to transform Americans' search for senior housing — including the often-agonizing hunt for long-term care.

The developers say the for-profit site, modeled after online-dating services and real-estate listings, is the first national database in real time of all senior housing in the U.S., including nursing homes, adult family homes, assisted-living and independent-living facilities.

Free to consumers and nonprofit agencies, the Web site is designed to find matches for anyone's senior housing needs — be that dementia care, a gay-friendly atmosphere, kosher diet or staffers who speak Japanese.

It also can report vacancies in real time, give virtual photo tours, sort by ZIP code or city or list senior housing options in the state or nation.

SNAP's success ultimately depends on its timeliness and the breadth and credibility of its information. That, in turn, depends on the participation of facilities and the ability of its support staffers to maintain the site, which does not guarantee the accuracy of its information.

Anyone in the nation can now log on and get a listing of facilities and their contact information in any city. But the ability to do a sophisticated, detailed search is primarily limited to Washington state — where marketing efforts so far have been concentrated.

That is expected to broaden as the site's developers market the service to housing providers in multiple cities next year.

"It's very mission oriented and all about making social change," said Eve Stern, co-founder of the Web site and now its president and chief operating officer. "It's going to get the job done faster, quicker and, hopefully, with a better match ... higher satisfaction ... better quality of life."

The for-profit venture is the idea of a small group of local entrepreneurs with other startups to their credit and backgrounds in high-tech, health care, senior housing and real estate. A few say the personal frustration of finding care for their own parents lead them to create SNAP.

The Web site is being introduced in partnership with Senior Services, a nonprofit social-services agency in Seattle, which has agreed to have its senior advocates use the Web site with clients.

Last year, Senior Services received more than 11,000 phone calls and 16,500 visits to its Web site seeking help to find long-term care.

"It will revolutionize things for the consumer and all of us trying to help people find the right place to live," said Terra McCaffree, an information manager at Senior Services.

"You'll have something at your fingertips that you never had before."

Frustrating search

The search for long-term care can be especially frustrating.

Nationwide, every day, thousands of older adults in some kind of health crisis are forced to move from home to get extra care.

Often armed only with a list of addresses, their families set out to find a desirable facility that's conveniently located with a bed available right away. They also want appropriate, quality care at an affordable price. And they might even be trying to do this search from out of town.

Some families go it alone. Others hire professionals, who may be paid by a facility for referrals. Or a hospital-discharge planner may spend hours faxing patient information to try to find space and the right fit in a hurry.

Now, hospitals and social workers in Washington — with the patient's permission — can enter confidential health information on the Web site into a patient's personal profile and come up with search results tailored to the person's needs. The search results can be e-mailed.

The site does not offer feedback from users or rate the quality of care. Links are provided, though, to the federal government's nursing-home inspection reports and the state long-term-care ombudsman, who advocates for residents' rights in all long-term-care settings.

Link to hospitals, groups

Several hospitals and advocacy groups such as the Alzheimer's Association also will provide a link to SNAP on their Web sites and teach their staffers how to use it.

Every senior-housing provider gets an initial free listing and a detailed profile that includes information about care, living-space options, lifestyle choices and cost.

But a daily fee is assessed housing providers for posting vacancies. There's also a charge for an enhanced listing that might include still photos or a virtual tour and a professionally written profile.

For-profit professionals who make their living helping people find long-term care will be charged about $350 a month to use the site.

Also, the site's developers say that what consumers find when they log on this week will be less complete than what they'll see a month from now. And while long-term-care providers are supposed to tell SNAP if they've run seriously afoul of state inspectors, there's no way to enforce that stipulation.

But SNAP staffers say they'll monitor business closures and license revocations to keep information up to date.

Several of the community's advocates for older adults are impressed with the new search tool's development and are cautiously optimistic about its usefulness.

In terms of access to information, "If it works the way they say it will, it could really be life changing," said Nora Gibson, executive director of ElderHealth Northwest.

Whether consumers will be satisfied remains to be seen.

Just about every expert — including workers at SNAP — cautions that technology can't replace human judgment.

Families responsible for vulnerable adults still should visit a facility before making a decision, and continue to monitor their loved one's care closely after they've moved in.

Marsha King: 206-464-2232 or mking@seattletimes.com

Copyright © 2006 The Seattle Times Company