What tech is right for your community and how can you seamlessly integrate it? Find out from CarePredict's Josh Studzinski.
We're on the precipice of really being proactive within communities and using the data to do that.
Josh Crisp is a senior living executive with more than 15 years of experience in development, construction, and management of senior living communities across the southeast.
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Lucas McCurdy is the founder of The Bridge Group Construction based in Dallas, Texas. Widely known as “The Senior Living Fan”.
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How do you align your teams over to this technology that you selected?
In this episode, we sit down with Josh Studzinski, Chief Growth Officer at CarePredict, to explore how data-driven technology and AI are reshaping the senior living industry. We discuss how operators can evaluate, implement, and measure the ROI of technology solutions—and why success starts with aligning organizational goals from the top down.
In this episode, we cover:
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This episode was recorded at the 2025 LeadingAge annual meeting
Produced by Solinity Marketing.
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00:46 - 01:00
Lucas McCurdy
Welcome to the Bridge the Gap Podcast, the Senior Living podcast with Josh and Lucas. Great day here. Leading Edge and Boston. Want to welcome a great guest, Josh Studzinski, CarePredict Chief Growth Officer. I nailed it there.
01:00 - 01:02
Josh Studzinski
We nailed it. You got it, man.
01:06 - 01:08
Lucas McCurdy
That was awesome and good to see you. Thanks for coming today. This is going to be a lot of fun.
01:06 - 01:08
Josh Studzinski
Yeah. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
01:08 - 02:08
Lucas McCurdy
So, obviously, like 2025 for Bridge the Gap. If I could sum it up in one central theme, it's technology. Every conversation that we have had, over 52 conversations this year, it seems technology is going to be a part of that conversation, and rightfully so. And I think a big part of those conversations is how does every operator and provider vet and try and then adopt and then track, like, is this actually valuable for us?
Everybody wants to know what the ROI is. Josh, these are conversations that you have been steeped in for many, many years. People have peppered you with this as probably a challenge that needs to be solved. Walk us through, from a provider's perspective and also a solution provider's perspective, how operators can handle conversations like this.
02:08 - 03:58
Josh Studzinski
Yeah. No problem. So I think it's tough because there are so many choices here at LeadingAge National, there are just so many choices out there in terms of technology, which makes it difficult. Right? You can almost go into analysis paralysis. Do we need this technology? Does it overlap with any of the other technologies that we have? I think when you look at it foundationally from a provider standpoint, it's what do we need that aligns over to our strategic goals as opposed to just implementing technology for technology's sake?
I think we see that a little bit with AI, right? Like everyone, here are the buzzwords, here's artificial intelligence. And they're like, we need to get it in our community and start doing it right. But what does that actually mean? And how does it align with our strategic engagements? And then when you're looking to implement technology, make sure that you're looking and tracking those metrics that are vital to the success.
Right. Are we looking to reduce our falls? Are we looking to improve the quality of care that we actually have? I think a lot of people talk about it, but they aren't actually implementing and tracking those metrics, whether they're doing a full-scale rollout at the enterprise level or they're looking to roll out a pilot, and you know, being a care product, you know, we've been around for about 13 years now, seeing proven ROI.
When we come in and do those pilots, we're going to say, Hey, here's the metrics we expect, and here's the timelines that we expect. You hit those as well, as opposed to kind of people coming in and just saying, Hey, let's just get this technology out there, get it into your community so you can start using it and playing with it.
But ultimately, we see those kinds of failures because they don't set the right foundation and the right metrics. So, it's tough. It's really tough because there are so many pieces to the puzzle in terms of technology, and looking at different pieces of technology. There are probably hundreds to go and look at. So, how do we actually go and implement that from a pilot standpoint? Are individual operators really specific to their goals?
03:58 - 04:49
Josh Crisp
Well, you know, one of the things I heard you say is that not only are there just so many providers out here of services, new innovative technologies, everything's changing so rapidly. So the analysis part of what's right. But I heard you also say that really forming your goals of where you want to go, and what you want to do?
What do you want to improve? It seems like that should be something that operators have a full grasp of, but it sounds like maybe that's not always happening from, you know, speaking to the operators, you guys get the opportunity to, to to be under the kimono, so to speak, and really talk to this is what we're at, the problem we're facing or we've had this challenge or we've implemented this technology and it hasn't worked. What can providers do better from a strategic standpoint to get that part right before they even select their technology provider?
04:49 - 05:31
Josh Studzinski
Yeah, I think it's an alignment from the top down. And you don't see that everywhere you see conversations. It's almost technology and providers where you see everyone has siloed tech. It's almost like an operator when you're looking at it, almost has siloed conversations and siloed goals because the director of it has different initiatives than the CEO, actually. So how do you align that all the way down the community?
I think I've seen struggles with that, and that goes both ways as well. So when you actually go and implement that technology, the community and operators should be pushing you, and you should also be pushing that up and say, Hey, here are best practices to go and implement that and make sure that we're alive at that time. I'm sure you don't see that.
05:31 - 06:16
Josh Crisp
Well, it seems like for the last several years, with the emergence of so much age tech and all the different types of technology, many organizations are implementing, and what you're hearing is the technology. Now, do we have enough data to support that? We are moving the needle on the ROI, on whether it's care and quality metrics to the financial bottom line, or is the technology working for the intended purpose?
I think we're starting to get there. I think we're starting to prove the ROI and not just have these numbers that we just throw on to a fancy website. When we look at it, one thing that we've excelled at a care product is actually documenting on-demand care and then applying that over to service plans. I think it's always been a gap.
06:16 - 07:39
Josh Studzinski
So, I've spent my tenure, I was at a company called Caremerge before, and we sold clinical technology. And one of the gaps is always unscheduled 80 hours. How do we track things that are outside of care? Plan. And that was always something that clinical leaders just didn't have great visibility into. And working at CarePredict. Now we're able to see those because of the on-demand assistance that people are able to get.
And then we can marry that over to the care plan. So Mrs. Smith might need some extra care because she's been asking for help with escorting and toileting, and all of these things that are outside of the plan. And we could go back to that, that option, and say, hey, you should be looking at this and adjusting that because maybe they need to move into assisted living level two and actually adjust that plan, which they're already providing the services.
Right. But you're not getting paid for those services, which is your product as an operator. So are able to help out with that reduction of falls, hospitalizations, and hospitalizations. We're starting to see that across the board. And now we're starting to get to the point of, okay, a lot of people are starting to prove ROI. And then how do you align your teams over to this technology that you selected?
There's got to be a culture fit, right? Like you're working with us day in and day out as a partner, and those partners need to reciprocate that type of relationship. So so we're starting to see it. And it's real hard dollars that operators are starting to see, which is just fantastic because it helps us to accelerate our ability to provide more value.
07:39 - 07:56
Josh Crisp
Well, so what are the best opportunities in the near future that you feel like you have nailed a solution for? If we can just implement that type of technology that we're really going to make improvements for the elders.
07:56 - 08:56
Josh Studzinski
Yeah, I would say it's definitely the care alignment, but then it's the predictive health that we've really started to accelerate with. So our technology is real-time location. We're using a wearable. We're using devices to actually get granular on where somebody is in their room, whether they are in the family room. Are they in the bathroom? What are they doing, getting out of there, getting up, and walking?
And all of that data provides great insights into how that person goes and lives their life. So we're getting a solid baseline. And when they go out of that baseline, we're able to show the community who those people are and what they should be doing to go and help that person. So if they're up at night going to the bathroom a bunch, if they're walking around at night, if that person should continue to hit us, we should really go and investigate.
So we're able to help build better care models because of that and be more proactive in the care as opposed to being more reactive when somebody does fall or somebody has a UTI. And now we're going to do something other at the hospital. So I would say that's what we're on the precipice of really being proactive within communities and using the data to do that, as opposed to being reactive.
08:56 - 10:47
Josh Crisp
You know, in the early days of technology, I say early days is like, I'm starting to age myself. I've been doing this for 20 years. You know, it seems like, no matter what technology you want to implement, what change you want you make, make it. It typically required someone in a supervisory role, even if it was a floor nurse or someone to essentially compile or read a report and then go and instruct caregivers on what they should be doing. Do you feel like we're at a place with technology now that the caregivers, the actual frontline workers, are able to make an immediate impact and difference because of the tools and resources in their hands?
09:37 - 09:55
Josh Studzinski
I would say we're getting there, and I think that's where AI is becoming the most powerful in terms of summarization and then making information executable from the frontline staff. I think that's been a disconnect, because you need to have that information right in front of them when they're going to provide care to those older adults within the community.
And that just hasn't been there because there's been so much data on the back end. So I think we're getting there and actually providing that information over to the caregivers to provide just exceptional account. Yeah. Residents and Carepredict. So we're looking to do that one. We have our mobile app, which provides great information.
And we actually live on the staff members, on the panel. So we are actually tracking them as we go throughout the community, interacting with different residents. So a building and voice technology here for them to document and get information, which just makes it easier opposed to picking something up. So not only are we going to use AI for the summarization, but using voice to actually scribe and provide information and document it, which creates efficiencies and all that good stuff that we're looking to do with the care team, because we know shortages and staff turnover are still problems. We've been talking about it for ten years now. Right. And that just doesn't seem like it's going to change anytime soon.
10:47 - 11:15
Josh Crisp
Yeah. Well, you know, Lucas and I here at leading age were talking about it's really cool because it seems like everybody you come in contact with, whether they're a solution provider, whether they're an operator, provider, everybody's story of what motivates them is, is pretty interesting. And it's something usually pretty personal for you guys. It can predict what your team's kind of driving force what motivates you guys to work so hard to equip these providers with a great solution?
11:15 - 12:10
Josh Studzinski
Yeah, I would say that two things. One is our CEO. It's been a personal mission for him. His parents needed care when he couldn't be around, and he was able to create, care, and predict to provide information to them when he wasn't able to be there due to changes within his own family. I would say at the broader level, for Carepredict, it's wanting to help out as many people as we can to provide the best level of care we can in communities on a daily basis.
We're talking to operators on a daily basis, and everybody who joins us has a personal story with either their family or working in a community, and those are the people that we want on our team. Our whole customer success team is made up of all nurses, executive directors, people who have been in the communities because they can help out the best, because it's hard when you haven't been in the trenches or haven't been in those communities to do that, or haven't been in the industry for a while. So we're looking for people whose personal mission is to really improve the senior care industry.
12:10 - 12:16
Josh Crisp
Lucas. Well, it's so good to have great partners to raise the bar for care and quality in our industry.
12:16 - 12:23
Lucas McCurdy
Yes, that deep level of understanding goes a long way in making this industry so great.
12:23 - 12:47
Josh Crisp
Yeah, absolutely. Well, thanks for joining us. It's a real treat for our listeners to be able to get some insight. We've got a front row seat here at LeadingAge to all the tech providers, and it's great to have partners like you guys that help to further the education and information for our listeners would love to connect them with you in our show notes. And it's awesome spending time with you. Thanks for taking the time. Here at LeadinAge. We know you've got a busy show.
12:47 - 12:59
Josh Studzinski
Thank you so much. Thank you for what you guys do. I've been around for over a decade in senior living, and it's just amazing the information you guys have been able to provide in the conversations. So thank you guys. Thank you guys for doing what you do.
12:59 - 13:10
Lucas McCurdy
I really appreciate it, Josh. And so, for those of you who want this content and so much more, you get a btgvoice.com, and we'll see you there. Thanks for listening to another great episode of Bridge the Gap.
Outro
Thanks for listening to Bridge the Gap podcast with Josh and Lucas. Connect with the BTG network team and use your voice to influence the industry by connecting with us at btgvoice.com.
