The practice has installed the Elsi Smart Floor system at two NSW aged care homes – the Tinonee Gardens Multicultural Village near Newcastle and at Twilight Aged Care’s Horton House in Gordon, Sydney.

Launched in 2011, the Finnish-manufactured flooring uses sensor technology embedded under most flooring surfaces to detect movement and has been installed in over 2,000 aged care homes. This is the first in the Southern Hemisphere.

ThomsonAdsett were the founders and remain the backers of the Sage educational tours. They travelled to Denmark to see the floors in situ and incorporated it into the Home of the Future stand at last year’s ACSA conference.

Rob Puflett, partner at ThomsonAdsett’s Sydney studio, says the technology is the next level if resident monitoring and behaviour prediction.

Some homes use pressure pads that trigger an alarm when a resident gets out of bed, but often residents will just climb out the other side to avoid activating the alarm.

Falls are one of the biggest causes of injury in aged care, with almost one in three older Australians suffering a fall every year.

Pictures: MariCare.