The 8 best care management solutions for 2024

Discover eight of the top care management solutions in 2024 - as well as a little more about what a care management solutions is, how they work and how to choose the right one for your care business.

What is a care management solution?

Good question.

Simply put, a care management solution, also known a digital care management solution, is a software system designed to help care providers run their businesses, replacing paper processes.

That's a fairly broad definition, and for a reason: no two solutions are quite the same. Care management solutions always include care planning and management: this allows you to create and manage care plans for service users, document care delivery, record observations and assessments, and monitor service user progress. Beyond that, these platforms can include many other products and features that cover almost every corner of your operations. These include: 

• Scheduling and rostering: Allows you to create and manage staff schedules and rosters, assign staff members to service users, and track staff availability and attendance.
• Invoicing and payroll: Streamlines billing and invoicing processes, tracks payments, and manages payroll.
• Compliance and auditing: Allows you to monitor your care delivery and make sure you're maintaining high standards, also great when it comes to showcasing evidence for a regulatory body or local authority tenders
• Workforce experience: Gives you the ability to store employee documents (such as right-to-work paperwork and onboarding records) as well as regularly communicate with your care teams in the field
• Communication: Allows you and your teams to easily share important information with a service user's wider 'care circle', such as emergency services and family members
• Analytics: Empowers you and your teams to use the mountains of care data you're entering every day to spot trends, see red flags and make smart decisions off the back of them.

Care management solutions are often cloud-based, which means that they can be accessed from any device with an internet connection.

So far, so good - but why should you consider bringing one on board?

The benefits of implementing a care management solution

Implementing the right care management solution can transform the way your care business operates - and by extension, how successful it is. Here are the main reasons why you should consider (the right) one: 

1. Efficiency (and therefore, profit)

Good quality care management platforms streamline administrative tasks, such as care planning, communication and reporting, which frees up carers and care managers to focus more on delivering high-quality care rather than being tied down by time-consuming paperwork.

Solutions that include rostering capabilities can take this even further, allowing you to make sure that runs are co-ordinated to reduce travel time. All this not only saves time but also enhances productivity, which is critical in a sector where margins are tight and skilled workforce is hard to come by. 

2. Enhancing the quality of care

Moving to a digital system is mission-critical to reduce risk and deliver reliably high quality care. For the team at CHD Care, part of an award-winning social care provider, "Working with a paper-based system meant that missed visits or medication issues were picked up days or weeks after the event, putting clients at risk and falling below CQC standards."

Moving to digital gave them real-time access to comprehensive client information, so carers can make informed decisions more quickly, leading to more personalised and accurate care. This real-time data access is instrumental in improving patient outcomes and increasing overall satisfaction.

3. Better compliance with regulations

Many care management platforms are designed with features that can help you adhere to industry standards and regulatory requirements from the likes of the CQC.This includes automated record-keeping, electronic medication administration records (eMAR), and reporting tools that ensure accurate and easily accessible documentation, particularly during audits.

4. Improved communication

Good care management solutions include integrated tools that enhance collaboration among carers, clients, and their families. At Birdie, this is called the ‘Care Circle’ and includes a Family App that’s used by over 26,000 families. This ensures that everyone involved in the care process is well-informed and coordinated, leading to more effective and seamless care delivery (and HOURs less time on the phone).

5. Business-critical insight

Lastly, these platforms provide valuable insights through data and analytics, helping care providers optimise resource, ensure consistency in quality care delivery and make sure that the business is making the most of potential growth areas. Analytics also helps in reducing errors, such as medication mistakes or missed appointments, thus enhancing client safety and boosting the overall reliability of the care process.

However, not all care management platforms are created equal, and some can leave critical gaps that aren’t covered by digital processes. This leads to what we call ‘papering over the cracks’ - when agencies are forced to combine paper processes and digital processes - and this can do far more harm than good.

So, how do you find the right fit? 

Key features to look for in a care management solution

The number of care management solutions on the market has changed rapidly in the last few years - with more choices than ever, how do you know what’s right for your business? 

1. Strong care planning capabilities

• Tools that allow for the creation and management of care plans tailored to individual client needs. 
• Full client profiles that allow carers and care managers to keep an ongoing patient-centred record 
• A well-designed mobile app to give carers real-time access to client information, care plans, and other critical data, regardless of their location. This should be easy for them to use in order to give full records of task completion, as well as punctuality. 
• A means to manage day-to-day communication between care office and carer, cutting down on wasted time and ensuring a clear paper trail for inspection purposes 
• Integrated eMAR so your team can manage the critical tasks of medication administration 
• Alerting so that issues can be resolved quickly

2. Smart scheduling and rostering

• Flexible scheduling tools that can accommodate changes easily 
• The ability to match carers with clients in a way that optimises both continuity of care and carer efficiency
• The ability to automatically adjust runs in line with travel time in order maximise efficiency 

3. Finance and workforce management

• The ability to invoice (including where multiple payers contribute to an individual client’s care) 
• The ability to run payroll for your carers, including making adjustments for National Minimum Wage 
• Support employee engagement through managing onboarding documents and right-to-work records

4. Data, data, data

• The ability to create reports to analyse where how your business is performing
• The ability to securely and compliantly share key data with relevant third parties

The 8 best care management solutions

It’s important to always research before making any decisions! Here are some of the most popular care management solutions for domiciliary care providers in the UK:

1. Birdie: Purpose-built for domiciliary care providers, Birdie is everything you need to run your care business - from care management and rostering, to finance and auditing - made easier, faster and safer with the power of data. Most homecare technology does a great job of digitising processes: it turns notes into clicks, paper into docs and calls into texts. At Birdie, we believe that this isn’t enough.

The care sector has ever-increasing demand and ever-dwindling resources: taking paper processes and putting them on a screen doesn’t solve the essential problem of ‘there’s never enough time, there’s never enough people’.

That’s where Birdie is different to other homecare technology: we make the business of caring easier, faster and safer with the power of data.

Data-powered technology gives you the power of insight and automation, so it’s easy to make smart decisions and act on them:

• you’ll not just fix medication problems, you’ll spot them instantly
• you’ll know where you stand with the CQC…before the CQC does
• you’ll know your roster is efficient, because it’s auto-allocated to match skills and travel time

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2. CareLineLive: A cloud-based care management software that provides domiciliary care providers with a range of tools and features to manage their operations more efficiently. These include scheduling and rostering, care planning and documentation, electronic call monitoring, staff management, invoicing, and real-time monitoring and reporting. CareLineLive is designed to reduce administrative tasks, making it a popular choice among domiciliary care providers.

3. CarePlanner: A web-based care management system that focuses on scheduling and rostering, care planning and documentation, staff management, and invoicing and payroll. It can enables domiciliary care providers to manage their operations more efficiently, with support of features like automatic scheduling and billing. CarePlanner also offers a mobile app for carers, allowing them to access and update client information on the go.

4. CareSys: A ccare management software that provides domiciliary care providers with a range of features, including care planning and documentation, scheduling and rostering, staff management, invoicing, and reporting and analytics. CareSys is designed to reduce administrative tasks, with reporting and analytics tools built to provide insights into business performance and outcomes.

5. CM2000: A care management system specialising in electronic monitoring and scheduling, risk management, staff management, and invoicing and payroll. CM2000 is designed to improve efficiency, reduce errors, and enhance the quality of care delivery. Real-time monitoring can ensure that domiciliary care providers are able to respond faster to issues or concerns.

6. iCareHealth: A care management software that offers care planning and documentation, electronic medication management, and staff management. iCareHealth is designed to reduce administrative tasks, enabling domiciliary care providers to re-focus on providing high-quality care to their clients. Features such as electronic medication management and real-time monitoring help ensure that clients receive a basic standard of care.

7. My Homecare: A care management software that provides domiciliary care providers features including care planning and documentation, scheduling and rostering and staff management. My Homecare is designed to improve care delivery and help domiciliary care providers to manage their operations more efficiently.

8. PASSsystem: A care management software that provides care planning and documentation, electronic medication management, staff management and analytics. PASSsystem is designed to reduce administrative tasks, enabling domiciliary care providers to focus on providing care to their clients. Features also include electronic medication management and real-time monitoring.

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How to choose your care management solution

Choosing the best care management solution for a domiciliary care business can be a challenging task! Here are some tips to make sure you choose a system as closely aligned to your business’ needs as possible: 

1. Identify your business needs: Start by evaluating your business requirements and identifying the areas that need improvement. This can include scheduling and rostering, care planning and documentation, staff management, invoicing and payroll, electronic call monitoring, and reporting and analytics.
2. Compare features: Look for care management solutions that offer the features you need, such as automatic scheduling, real-time monitoring, electronic call monitoring, and invoicing and payroll. Consider whether the solution is user-friendly and offers a clear workflow that is easy to use and understand.
3. Check user reviews: Read reviews from other care providers to get a sense of the pros and cons of each solution. This can help you evaluate each solution's effectiveness and determine whether it is the right fit for your business.
4. Consider pricing: Evaluate each solution's pricing structure, including any ongoing costs or fees, to determine whether it fits within your budget.
5. Look at security and uptime: Make sure that your care management solution has up-to-date security and priorities uptime. If your system goes down, or has a data breach, then that can be very distressing for you, your team and your care recipients - not to mention a potential safeguarding hazard. An easy way to find a care management solution with strong security and uptime is to choose one from the NHS assured supplier list, as they have had to go through rigorous testing to be a part of it. 
6. Evaluate customer support: Consider the level of customer support each solution offers, such as technical assistance, training, and ongoing support, to ensure that you can get the help you need when you need it.

By taking the time to thoroughly evaluate each care management solution, you can make an informed decision and choose the one that best fits the needs of your domiciliary care business - after that, it’s time to take on the task of onboarding you and your team to your new software. Find out more about how Birdie helps our partners take on that journey here…

Want to see if Birdie for your business? Hit the demo button below to schedule a quick chat with one of our experts...

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