Pathway Senior Living’s VIVA! program offers exciting opportunities, like Camp VIVA!, where residents enjoy the full camping experience. The program received ALFA Best of the Best Program to Spotlight recognition because it aims to allow residents more choices and freedom in a creative way.
Pathway Senior Living offers what it calls an “extreme wellness” adventure to senior living residents: a 24-hour camping trip to a scenic handicapped-accessible campground by a lake. The residents get to enjoy camping experiences, including fishing, swimming, hiking, eating outdoors, sleeping on cots in cabins, and roasting marshmallows by the campfire.
The experience has been known to have a profound effect on participants, by bringing back memories, immersing them in nature, and giving them a break from routine. It also has enabled staff and residents to bond in new ways. “Many seniors have had quite a trying life. We need to get out like this. We need a vacation,” says Cokessie Tate, who at 91 took her first camping trip through Camp VIVA!
“I felt like I was back in the Girl Scouts,” says Barbara Sharf, the oldest camper at 94.
Camp VIVA! is part of Pathway’s new VIVA! program, a resident-centered cultural shift that includes encouraging caregivers to take on responsibilities beyond their traditional role, serves as a “life enrichment aide” for the residents in their charge. “Camp VIVA! really embodies what VIVA! stands for, which is that anything is possible,” says Maria Oliva, chief people officer. “We’re able to deliver more than just good care. We want to provide an environment where [residents] have a reason to get up every day. That’s all we really wanted to do.”
To create cultural change, Pathway changed job descriptions and expectations to transcend task-oriented efficiency and enable aides and other employees to seek out opportunities to help residents lead more fulfilled lives. Certain processes have been streamlined to allow caregivers time to, say, read aloud to residents or lead an activity. “We wanted to change the staff focus from ‘I just do activities,’ to create an environment that empowers staff,” says Oliva. “That is a process that takes a long time to change. Efficiency causes people to minimize choice and the freedom residents have.”
Residents, too, are encouraged to take advantage of those choices and freedom by using their individual talents to lead activities and make a difference in their larger communities. Some residents even interview job candidates. “This is not just busywork. It is work that has meaning,” says Oliva. “They actually lead and run programs.”
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