Touch Community to roll out new tracking system to better monitor elderly
By Hetty Musfirah Abdul Khamid & Shaffiq Alkhatib, Channel NewsAsia | Posted: 05 November 2009 1801 hrs

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SINGAPORE : Come January, voluntary welfare organisation Touch Community Services will be rolling out a new tracking system so that its staff can better monitor the elderly under its care.

Radio Frequency Identification technology (RFID) will be used to tag 120 households in the pilot phase. The system will be rolled out to all of its 330 clients by the first quarter of next year.

In 20 years, one in five Singapore residents would be above the age of 65. And that means more demand for elderly care services. So Touch Community hopes its new tracking system can make its services more efficient.

Every time a volunteer delivers food, he will use a hand-held gadget to scan a device - the size of a 20-cent coin - which will be stuck on the front door of the elderly's home.

"Every time the meal is delivered to the house, the volunteers who deliver the meal will have a reader and he will tag the reader... These readers will give us data on whether the meal is delivered on time, and whether it's delivered to the right place," said Kavin Seow, director of Touch Community Services.

The system will also be useful in monitoring other areas such as housekeeping and nursing needs.

Staff and volunteer will bring along a pack of what is known as "incident tags". Each tag represents an incident - for example, if the elderly has had a fall, is in need of medical care, or has not had his food delivered as schedule.

"The purpose of tagging allows us to capture and track the interactions between the caregiver and the beneficiary or the elderly, and to ensure that we have got an optimal system to deploy staff, resources and volunteers to address needs," said Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports Vivian Balakrishnan.

It will cost some S$25,000 to implement the tracking system.

More caregiver support and training programmes are also on the cards.

Touch Community Services and NTUC ElderCare will be providing skills training for informal caregivers, like foreign domestic workers.

The training programmes are expected to be rolled out early next year. Both organisations are aiming to each train some 500 caregivers annually. - CNA /ls