Umbrella Solutions Blog
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Coverage Features and Fixes – February 2020 Part 2
Making Coverage even better
Although we’ve already updated Coverage this month, there’s no rules saying we can’t release more in February. Maybe we’re just motivated by the leap year giving us an extra day.
Thanks to the feedback from our amazing customers, here’s what is being release to Coverage this week.
Updated Design
- New logos but the same familiar colors
New Categories
- Due to popular demand we’ve added Feedback and Training categories to our Area for Improvement and Evidence responses
- We’ve also ordered alphabetically
Response Copy fixes
- We found a couple of bugs in our new favourite feature but we got them sorted
Reports
- The Standards tabs are now in numerical order, rather than the order in which you created them
Provider Overview Dashboard
- Non-compliance and Sanctions data is now reflective of the Government published data
- Hopefully you won’t see anything there!
Minor Bugs Squashed
- Nobody’s perfect, so we are fixing up a couple of bugs thanks to our diligent users and testers
Updates, we’ve got you covered
Do you know what you have to do to get updates for Coverage?
Zero, zilch, zip, nada, nothing!
Just sit back and relax, the updates will be applied automatically, you don’t need to lift a finger.
Bringing your Plan for Continuous Improvement to life
When it comes to the self-assessment process for the new Aged Care Quality Standards, it’s a relatively consistent process to other compliance exercises.
- understand requirements
- formulate responses
- self-rate each requirement
- provide evidence and information to support the rating
Sure, there’s a lot of effort to collate the evidence and information but most organisations have it … somewhere. So, whether you’re using spreadsheets or Coverage to manage your self-assessment and audit responses, it’s just a matter of time and effort to get your assessment completed. But, and we might be a little biased here, Coverage does make it much easier 😊
So why is the Plan for Continuous Improvement causing headaches for providers?
At Umbrella Solutions, we spent a lot of time researching the new Standards reporting expectations and we understand why it’s difficult and also how to make it easier to manage.
As the name suggests, Plan for Continuous improvement (PCI) is meant to highlight the efforts and actions of providers to enhance the quality of their services. On the surface it seems quite aligned to the evidence required by the Standards.
However there’s a subtle difference; evidence is static, continuous improvements are alive.
If you have a resident service policy, you’re well on the way to meeting the Requirements of Standard 1. Grab the document. Attach it as evidence. Done.
But how do you show you’re improving your service offering? And better still; how do you track it?
You need some key pieces of information to track PCI activities
- What you’re improving
- Who’s responsible for it
- When is it due
- What’s the outcome
Some initiatives are large enough to be run as a project, so you can probably track that in a project management tool.
But what about the smaller operational tasks that your staff are working on like training, policy and procedure updates, preventative maintenance and process improvements? There may be 20, 30 or even hundreds of improvements aged care providers are making over a year.
The Government and assessors want to see all the things you’re working on now and since the last assessment. You need one place to see it together and to bring it to life.
We’ve got you covered
Coverage provides a unified location for all your responses to the Standards as well as Plans for Continuous improvement. With our prebuilt, live dashboard and reporting we give you visibility over your PCI activities
The Government has a separate PCI reporting template for providers to fill in. However, we believe you’re better off to keep all your responses and actions for the Standards in one place so you cut down on data entry.
In Coverage, PCI activities are recorded as Area for Improvement records against each Standard and Requirement. We also have a simple copy feature that allows you to duplicate an Area for Improvement to multiple Standards and Requirements in just a few clicks. You can even copy them across multiple residential or home care services!
To give you a full view of your activities, we have a live PCI dashboard and mini dashboards on the Overview pages.
We also have built in email notifications so staff receive an email when an Area for Improvement is assigned to them. They’ll also receive a reminder 2 days before the response is due and on the day that it’s due.
Oh, and let’s not forget you can export a PCI report anytime you want. And PCI activities are even included in the Self-Assessment and Audit reports.
We can get you up and running in Coverage with no technology support required.
So take control and bring your Plan for Continuous Improvement to life with Coverage.
Coverage Features and Fixes – February 2020
Coverage’s cool new features
Thanks to the feedback from our amazing customers, we are releasing some great new features and squashing a couple of bugs.
Here’s what is being released on the 6th of February.
Response Copy feature
- Copy any response to any Standard and Requirement in one go
- You can even copy it to other services!
Requirement rating in PCI view
- Just a little change that will help you prioritise your work. Now you can see whether you’re Developing, Meeting or Exceeding right from the PCI page
Provider Overview Dashboard
- No more static data, you’ll have visibility across all your services and see a history of your ratings month to month
Reports with attachments
- Your attachments are just as important as your response, so we’re zipping them up so you can download them at the same time
Minor Bug Squashed
Nobody’s perfect, so we are fixing up a couple of bugs thanks to our diligent users and testers
Updates, we’ve got you covered
Do you know what you have to do to get updates for Coverage?
Zero, zilch, zip, nada, nothing!
Just sit back and relax, the updates will be applied automatically, you don’t need to lift a finger
Come meet Umbrella Solutions at ITAC 2020
We are excited to be exhibiting at the ITAC 2020 Conference which showcases the best aged care technology and solutions. The conference is being held at the Brisbane Royal International Convention Centre on the 3rd and 4th of March.
The theme of the conference – Transforming Independence through Innovative Technology emphasises the importance of assistive technology supporting service quality and independence.
This aligns perfectly with Umbrella Coverage, a custom designed platform which helps aged care providers manage the new Standards to ensure the best service quality for their residents and community.
Umbrella Solutions will be showcasing Coverage at Pod 10 located just near the main foyer entrance. So drop around and say hi to the team.
In just a few minutes you’ll see how easy it is to use Coverage and ensure you are in control of the new Aged Care Quality Standards.
Our CEO and Chief Product Officer will be there to discuss our UX design process as well as walk through our new features.
If you’d like to arrange a meeting with one of our team, please reach out via our contact us form.
And what’s a conference without some cool merchandise? We’ve got you covered.
See you there!
ITAC 2020 is brought to you by the Aged Care Industry Information Technology Council (ACIITC) supported by Leading Age Services Australia and Aged and Community Services Australia
Umbrella Solutions releases Coverage beta program
Updated 21/02/2020: The beta program has now closed as we are about to release Coverage into the wild. Massive thanks to all our beta users and providers for helping make our platform even better. 🙏
The team at Umbrella Solutions is proud to announce the release of Coverage, a new system to manage monitor and report on the new Aged Care Quality Standards for your home care services and residential facilities.
Coverage will be available in a limited beta program running from 12th December 2019 to 12th of March. The beta program is open to Australian aged care providers for free during this period. There are limited spots available, so get in quick to get access to Coverage.
Coverage Provider Overview
✓ Setup in minutes with no technology support required
✓ Cost effective monthly fee with unlimited users
✓ Live dashboards and instant reporting
✓ Monitor all your home care services and residential facilities in one place
✓ Instantly produce Plans for Continuous Improvement, self-assessment and audit reports
Umbrella Solutions will be providing production level support for beta users through the duration of the program and they’ll be helping us to enhance Coverage for the aged care community.
To learn more about Coverage and apply for the beta program, see our Coverage product page.
Aged Care Quality Standards, Self Assessments, Audits & PCI
From July 2019, the new Aged Care Quality Standards mean that providers need to adapt the way they respond to self assessments, audits and plans for continuous improvement. Although the transition may seem overwhelming, with the help of Coverage, we can simplify your administration and reporting.
We all want improved quality of care for our customers, but that doesn’t mean that reporting on our capabilities should be difficult.
The new Standards bring consistency across all aged care providers, but unfortunately the the reporting requirements are a little disjointed.
Umbrella Solutions designed Coverage to simplify the efforts required to produce reports for:
- self assessment
- audits, both announced and unannounced
- plan for continuous improvements (PCI)
Providers understand that if self assessment or audits aren’t managed correctly, they can lead to notices of non-compliance, or worse, sanctions.
Plans for continuous improvement add an additional viewpoint for the Government which may also have an impact on service status. Risk management is key to improving services, so the better visibility you have on your PCI activities, the more prepared you’ll be for the audits.
Aligning self assessments, audits and plans for continuous improvement
At first glance, these three activities seem quite distinct, however that are all share fundamental elements:
- record evidence of compliance
- record and status of improvement actions
- self rating for each Standard’s Requirements.
- ability to put forward other information
Armed with important understanding, Umbrella Solutions developed Coverage to have a central data store of rating, evidence, actions and other information.
This allows you enter the data once, but have it appear in self assessment, audits and PCI reports.
With Coverage, you’ll has less data entry and can instantly produce reports for internal use or reporting back to the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission.
Coverage also brings your PCI to life. Now you can monitor changes as they happen so you can track your improvements across your facility, home care services or even your whole Provider service portfolio.
To see Coverage, our aged care standards software, in action, check out our product page.
Umbrella Solutions isn’t stopping at Coverage. We are developing a broad suite of aged care software and solutions. We’d love to hear about your ideas, so we can develop solutions that simplify your job. Reach out to us via our contact us page.
The new Aged Care Quality Standards
Time for change: The new Standards
The Australian Government has implemented the new Aged Care Quality Standards on the 1st of July 2019.
Umbrella Solutions has been following the development and release of the Standards and believes they will help providers better manage the services and give their clients a improved quality of life.
The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission has some excellent resources for providers. Here are some of the ones we’ve found most helpful.
Aged Care Quality Standards Consumer Outcomes
Aged Care Quality Standards
Aged Care Quality Standards Fact Sheet
Aged Care Quality Standards Performance Assessment Methodology
The government have even more resources available here.
Our design process
When Umbrella Solutions started work on Coverage, we wanted to create a system that made the job of reporting on the new Aged Care Quality Standards, as simple as possible.
With the help of our fantastic design and development partners, we’ve been able to produce an easy to use system that takes the complexity out of administering the new Standards.
Simplify the Standards
At Umbrella Solutions we fully support the new Aged Care Quality Standards and we strongly believe they will have a positive impact on the lives of those in aged care.
However the transition to the new Standards can be a little daunting. We have extensively reviewed the standards, requirements and new regulations to ensure providers can manage their obligations with the minimum amount of effort.
The key to this has been identifying that the Standards are consistently used across self-assessment, audits (both announced and unannounced) and the Plans for Continuous Improvements (PCI). Armed with information, Coverage was designed to allow providers to manage all three processes in a single system without having to replicate actions or evidence.
Setting the foundations
Aligning to our core value of simplicity, we developed Coverage to:
- be configured in minutes, without any IT support
- require no extensive training or manuals
- have simple billing and licensing
- work on any device
- manage multiple facilities and home care services
- live facility, home care services and provider level dashboards
- produce self-assessment, audit and plans for continuous improvements reports in seconds
Check out Coverage to see how easy it is to take control of the new Standards.
Design that delights
As much as I’d like to take all the credit for the design, we have to thank our wonderful partners at Flip for bringing Coverage to life. They incorporated a clean, welcoming and playful design to Coverage.
Just because we’re doing important work, it doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun.
What’s next?
After the release of Coverage, we’ll be starting on the next round of development. We’ve already got a pipeline of work ready to go, but we’re also taking feedback from Coverage users to ensure we’re working on the features that mater most.