Tim Greenwood and Bruce Jeffers from Five Good Friends and Jason Skennerton from Plena Healthcare explain how Lookout helps them provide better care for their clients.

The challenge

Jason Skennerton works for Plena Healthcare, Australia's largest mobile allied healthcare provider. They're an aged care specialist, providing services like physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech pathology, dietetics and podiatry services in the comfort of people's homes.

Jason explains when his team gets referrals from other providers, they rarely get enough information about the client's medical history and care needs.

“For example, if our physiotherapists are going out on site to treat a consumer, we won't often know if they've had a fall recently or if they've had some sort of incident,” he said.

It means the service they provide can end up being quite limited.

The results

However, that's not how it goes with their partner, Five Good Friends. When Plena Healthcare is referred to a client from Five Good Friends, they know they will get enough information to provide the best quality care.

Five Good Friends uses Lookout. Each of their Members has a profile which explains exactly what's needed, that person's medical history and any recent issues they've had.

According to Five Good Friends Care Coordinator Tim Greenwood, it all starts with the Member.

“They'll have a need, whether it's their ageing care need or something that they need help with. And from there, we'll set up a referral (to a third-party provider),” he said.

Sometimes the Member will have a provider in mind or in other instances, they can use the Five Good Friends Marketplace, which is a curated list of approved and compliant third-party providers.

"It's all in one. It makes things efficient and allows you to care for people better"

The Member and their care team can browse the Marketplace and choose a supplier like Plena Healthcare. Once they've chosen, Lookout sends the referral directly to the supplier. They then receive quality information about the Member to make sure they can meet that need.

“It provides a really comprehensive overview of both medical and care services that consumers currently have,” Jason explained.

Once they've accepted the placement, it means they can get to work quicker.

“Our therapist can get in the home and hit the ground running in terms of what's going to be the appropriate treatment plan,” he said.

Bruce explains how Lookout protects the Member.

“That link will only remain in place if that has been accepted. If we have sent that information across to an allied health professional… and they come back and say 'no, we don't accept it,' we can revoke that access. They no longer have access to that information,” he said.

That's the real benefit of Lookout, according to Tim.

“It's all in one. It makes things efficient and allows you to care for people better,” he concluded.

Words of advice

“If you were thinking about using Lookout, I would definitely say go for it… Talk to the team. There are some great features that you can use to really strengthen your organisation and get the benefit to your staff as a care management team. But it also benefits people living in their homes and their family members.” - Tim Greenwood - Care Coordinator, Five Good Friends