New toolkit aids property-provider partnerships

A new resource from the LeadingAge Center for Housing Plus Services is designed to assist affordable senior housing properties and healthcare providers in working together to help low-income older adults remain healthy and independent for as long as possible.

“We believe that, working together, housing and healthcare providers can launch initiatives that will allow them to meet these mutual goals of helping vulnerable older adults better manage their healthcare,” Robyn Stone, DrPH, senior vice president of research at LeadingAge, said in a statement.

The centerpiece of the Housing and Health Partnerships Toolkit is a 47-page resource called Housing and Health Care: Partners in Healthy Aging, which:

• Outlines the healthcare challenges that housing properties can help healthcare providers address.
• Guides housing providers through the process of identifying and cultivating partnerships with physician practices, hospitals, health systems, accountable care organizations and other healthcare entities.
• Offers step-by-step instructions on structuring and implementing a housing-health partnership.
• Explores the wide range of health-related programs that housing-health partnerships can implement based on the needs of housing residents. For example, partners might offer resident education and fitness programs, health screening and monitoring, support after a hospital stay or increased access to primary care services.

The toolkit also includes:

• Short videos exploring the benefits housing-health partnerships can bring to low-income older adults, their healthcare providers and their housing properties.
• Video interviews with healthcare practitioners describing their own collaborations with affordable housing communities. These clinicians also offer their insights regarding the benefits that patients, healthcare providers and payers are likely to reap when housing and healthcare providers work together.
• Educational resources designed to help healthcare entities understand the affordable housing world.
• A return on investment calculator that organizations can use to estimate the financial value of their housing-health partnership.

The resource was funded by a grant from the AARP Foundation.

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