St. John’s COO Highlights How Technology Can Enhance Senior Care
At St. John’s, innovation is approached with a focus on improving the experiences of residents, families, and employees. Ryan Gilmartin, St. John’s Chief Operating Officer, was featured in a September 4 Rochester Business Journal column where he discusses how senior living organizations can implement new technology and still keep human connection at the center of care.
According to Gilmartin, the growing role of artificial intelligence tools and other technology can help streamline administrative work and improve communication and efficiency in healthcare. However, he writes that technology should support people, not replace them. “In senior living, the question isn’t, ‘What technology should we adopt?’ Instead, it’s, ‘How can technology help us better deliver our mission?’” says Gilmartin.
Gilmartin notes that technology can help reduce administrative burdens and give employees more time to focus on what matters most: caring for and connecting with the people they serve.
“Healthcare is, and always will be, a people business,” Gilmartin writes. “No technology can replace the compassion of a caregiver, the reassurance of a conversation with a family member, or the trust that develops between residents and the people who serve them every day.”
The article highlights St. John’s recent implementation of Profility, an AI-driven, centralized admissions platform that consolidates referrals from multiple hospital systems into a single dashboard. By reducing the need for staff to navigate multiple portals and log in, the technology streamlines the admissions process and allows employees to spend more time welcoming new residents and supporting families.
Gilmartin also emphasizes that successful technology adoption depends on the people using it. Introducing new systems requires communication, education, training, and ongoing support to help employees understand why changes are being made and how they can improve the resident experience.
“Technology projects succeed because people succeed and not the other way around,” Gilmartin writes.
Gilmartin urges healthcare leaders to approach innovation with curiosity and purpose. As technology evolves, he writes, organizations should focus on using it to strengthen relationships and connections at the core of senior care. “Technology will continue to evolve but our mission to serve people will not,” Gilmartin writes. “When we use innovation to strengthen rather than replace the human connections at the heart of healthcare, everyone benefits: our employees, our residents, their families, and the communities we serve.”