Change, from social care to sofa cushions, is a constant.   

For a decade we at Nourish Care have been proud to help shape that change in social care. When we launched Nourish care technology was in its infancy. A vague selection of ideas and applications attempting to address a complex collection of people, processes and promises. Our approach was rooted in our understanding, bringing together our technical expertise with our personal experiences of care to ensure that care technology always put people first. From the very beginning, Nourish has been built on one simple but powerful belief: the person supported matters most. 

This belief is why we develop all our functionality through coproduction. Our commitment to collaboration is felt throughout our system. Thanks to this approach our understanding of care is deeper, our experiences wider and our expertise sharper than when we started. We continue to grow with our users just as social care technology enters its awkward adolescence. The past decade has shown us the potential for technology in social care, while Nourish users have revealed to us the best applications for our software, opening our eyes to the opportunities for supporting positive change in the wider system of care. In response, we are releasing several new Nourish products to support the wider care sector. 

This expansion of our application is rooted in keeping people at the centre of our systems. We know growth demands structure, scaling demands clarity, and crucially, care demands trust. Structure can be built, clarity provided but trust, trust must be earned.  

Nourish Care is the longstanding name of our platform and our business. More than that it is a promise, a commitment to community, coproduction and care. We will be changing the name of our platform to accommodate the new products we have developed for the wider system of care. 

We are keeping the promise. 

Our new naming convention reflects our renewed focus on people. Technology should feel as natural as the care it supports. That’s why we’ve ensured that every product name reflects not just what the platform does, but how it makes people feel. 

Nourish Care will become Nourish Better Care 
It’s important to remember where you started! Nourish Better Care is the most trusted and customisable care management system for residential providers in the UK. 

Nourish Rostering will become Nourish Empower  
All the tools a home care provider needs to support their community and manage their service. 

Nourish Community will become Nourish Better Care at Home 
Combining the mobility and admin of Nourish Empower with the industry leading point of care functionality of Nourish Better Care to support effective processes and drive improved outcomes. 

Nourish Mobile Device Management (MDM) will become Nourish Protect  
Keep your devices secure and your community’s data safe with our mobile device management system. 

Nourish Insights
Get the full picture of your service with our data dashboards so you can make more informed, more effective decisions. 

Nourish eLearning  
Available through our home care platforms, Nourish eLearning offers an integrated, accredited by CPD and Skills for Care, library of care courses for your team to utilise, supported with real time reporting. 

Nourish Care will continue to be the name of our business, with the specific names of products reflecting the impact they deliver for care providers and your communities. 

We are not the only ones changing. You are too. Our users have changed so much over the past decade, through digitisation, updated regulations, and new legislation, without ever losing sight of the people that make care so special. With our new, multiple product approach, we are establishing our foundation for future growth alongside you. So, we can best respond to the needs of today, and the challenges of tomorrow.  

No two people with support are the same. Uniqueness is the blessing, and the curse of social care. One size will very much not fit all. You need the right tools for the job, and the best people behind them to support you. 

To make it easier to find the right products for your community we created the Nourish Product Ecosystem. Each circle reflects a different focus for our products and the impact it will have on your community. 

Care Delivery – For Feeling Supported  
Technology that steps back, so care can step forward. 

Continuous Improvement – For Feeling Assured  
Because confident carers create safer, more consistent outcomes. 
 
Operations – For Feeling Secure  
Supporting care teams to be prepared, skilled, and sure of what comes next. 
 
Connectivity – For Feeling Connected  
Bringing together every piece of the care puzzle around the person. 

This approach goes beyond categorisation. It lays the foundation from which every new product, every innovation, and every solution we launch builds towards something bigger.  

Most importantly, it ensures that as we scale, we never lose sight of what made us great, keeping the person supported at the centre of care. 

Imagine a healthcare system where care teams feel empowered instead of overwhelmed. Where families feel reassured instead of disconnected. Where people receiving care feel safe, valued, and heard.  

That’s the world we’re building.  

And we’re not waiting.  

We have coordinated internally
So our teams live and breathe this philosophy.  

We are communicating externally
So our customers feel the impact as soon as possible.

We will continue to co-produce
Because technology should evolve with the people it serves. 

Change is a constant, a promise, and a challenge. One that can only be met in the same way we always have here at Nourish, by working together. Coproducing our products so that people are always at the centre of everything we design, develop and do. Because after all, change, like care, is human. 

We’ve got lots of exciting plans coming soon, if you want to build the future of social care with Nourish, contact us directly today. 

When Wes Streeting announced his three key shifts for the National Health Service (NHS) at the Labour Party Conference at the end of September social care’s ears were burning. A move from analogue to digital, hospital to community and sickness to prevention is a move towards care. Clearly social care has a big part to play in the future of the NHS. And technology plays a crucial role in the future of social care. When applied correctly digital solutions empower us to improve both efficiency and outcomes. Which offers care technology a central role in the government’s ongoing attempts to stage a digital revolution in health and care. We all know the why, given social care’s enduring challenges. It is uncovering the precise, who, what, when, and how of the matter that remains something of a mystery.  

We recently headline sponsored the Home Care Association (HCA)’s Tech & Homecare conference. A day of insights, inquisition and understanding for leading home care providers and technology suppliers. On the day our CMO, Lee Gilbert, hosted a panel featuring a who’s who of digital rostering and AI suppliers discussing data, while The King’s Fund’s Pritesh Mistry joined HCA’s CEO Dr Jane Townson OBE to ask, ‘How can technology solutions help move care closer to home?’. The latter a conversation underpinned by the recently published, Nourish Care sponsored, study exploring ‘The reality of, and potential for, digitally enabled care in the community’. Reflecting the collaborative spirit of co-development that defines modern, outstanding care, these conversations detailed a variety of ongoing efforts to move social care from analogue to digital. Their success, their missteps, and the road still ahead. 

Chair: Lee Gilbert, CMO, Nourish 
Nuno Almeida, CEO, Nourish 
Steve Sawyer, Managing Director, Access Group 
Robin Batchelor, CEO, everyLife Technologies 
Matthew Bond, CEO, Borderless 
Abeed Mohammed, Co-founder, Birdie

There is already a wealth of positive examples of technology improving care quality. Providers applied digital solutions to a selection of the challenges they face. Both The King’s Fund research, and each of the panellists, presented their own positive instances. Pritesh detailed several different, key, areas that are already befitting from digital solutions, such as communication, care co-ordination and personalisation. Dr Townson added to this during their conversation, highlighting some Local Authority’s recent adoption of ‘magic notes’ as an example of technology changing people’s lives. 

The panel built upon these cases with a specific focus on utilising existing data in systems. Matt Bond shared how Borderless share and aggregate data to pass benefits to individual people by finding the gaps in your existing service. The other four panellists all pointed to the efficiency their respective rostering platforms bring to care providers. When Robin Batchelor brought attention to the current inflection point in care technology it resonated around the room. Nuno Almeida agreed, “We’ve spent 14 years building the foundations. It’s not rocket science; the rocket science lies in your ability to react to needs.” 

That is the crux of the matter, when we move from analogue to digital, we have to retain our focus on people’s needs. The ability to react to these needs is defined by our ability to engage with them. One of the biggest fears about moving from analogue to digital is based in the apprehension of losing the human touch that has always guided health and care in the UK. A fact reflected in two of the recommendations from the King’s Fund’s research. The need to ‘Shift culture to embrace the public’s digital capability’ and ‘Support staff to embed tech in their roles’. Neither of which are groundbreaking discoveries, but do require fresh ideas to address. Such as Scottish Care’s Care Technologist role. We know the potential of carers, their adaptability and commitment to any idea that can improve outcomes for their community.  

What we need to do is make engaging with, and championing, care technology a simpler process. Which is not something that can be done overnight. “Asking people what is important to them is the biggest gap in our data,” admitted Nuno during the panel. “But this is also a big opportunity for us, asking, ‘What will really make a difference?’” The more we can involve people in the design process, the more ‘frontline’ feedback we can apply to our development. This co-production keeps people at the heart of care technology, which is crucial as we move to put technology at the heart of care.

Dr Townson concisely summarised this issue during her talk with Pritesh. ‘Technology for technology’s sake is not progress’. Innovation cannot be disruption in care, the standard approach for technology entering a new sector. The responsibilities are too great. We have to understand the barriers and develop enablers for adoption in the workforce and communities they support. Any one software solution aiming to promote wrap around care and support needs to ask itself a simple question. ‘How will the care providers work alongside our tech?’ 

Pritesh highlighted the need for this focus in his research with The King’s Fund. One of the recommendations from this research underlines the need to ‘develop strategies for co-developing digitally enabled services’. Specifically raising the point that developing a strategy for co-development and patient-led service design will help to direct digital service development and strategy. While this suggestion calls for action from ICSs, ICPs, the NHS and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), it speaks to all digital suppliers and providers in social care. The move from analogue to digital in care must involve people at every step, or it is sure to get lost.

Nuno spoke about the need to ‘crawl, walk, then run, to get to data quality’. A process that rings true for all forms of digital technology. When The King’s Fund recommends ‘A national vision to guide local decisions’ it is not calling for a direct mandate. It is asking for a personalisable framework. ‘A guiding national vision, with local flexibility as to how it is achieved. One that will help to align the efforts of technology innovators, health and care providers, and leaders designing improved community-based services.’  

The HCA’s conference was an example of just that endeavour. A selection of leaders, creators and providers sharing experiences and ambitions to help shape the future of care as we move from analogue to digital. One based in the commitment to collaboration that makes care the beating heart of our communities. After all, if you’re going to solve a mystery machine, it’s best to do it with a gang.