Our Vision for Aging Services

At WEL, we are creating a new paradigm of aging services - transforming Continuing Care Retirement Communities (CCRCs) to Enhanced Living Communities (ELCs) that focus on creating an environment of possibilities that sparks the imagination of each individual to discover his or her own purpose and fulfillment. In short, we are breaking the "rules" of aging. In the near term, we have been creating new service approaches to enhance the lives of our residents, and we have been optimizing our existing facilities and services; in the long term, we are developing self-sustaining, well-funded, market-driven service models.

Our Vision for the Future

SHIFT: Senior Health & Housing Initiative for Transformation

By the year 2040, this country will need to spend roughly 20 percent of our Gross Domestic Product on Social Security, Medicare, and the federal portion of Medicaid programs to support the aging. The federal government is not yet dealing with this issue, but eventually it must. We believe that when solutions are implemented, the aging population and their service providers will be disadvantaged significantly. WEL is determined to find a meaningful solution to this financial crisis looming on our horizon, and we have made it a strategic priority. In 2007, we developed a possible solution: a senior living model with the potential to deliver holistic, comprehensive health care and housing services to the aging population across a broad socioeconomic platform. Our new model, Senior Health & Housing Initiative for Transformation (SHIFT), can improve access and provide better outcomes at a lower cost. We have made considerable progress since early 2007 in introducing and gaining support for this new concept within the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and at the federal level. For more information about SHIFT, click here.

Aging Revolution Summit: Transforming the Way Our Industry Looks at Aging Services

The Aging Revolution summits in 2007 and 2008, presented by the Wesley Enhanced Living Foundation, convened providers from virtually every aspect of aging services and allied fields, as well as an array of elected officials and policy makers for discussion about the current and future aging services landscape. The Aging Revolution Summits:

Raised the level of awareness about the dearth and affordability of comprehensive senior housing and health care services, understand how new disease treatments will impact longevity, and embrace the ominous economic and demographic realities facing our nation and their likely impact on aging services providers
Served as a mechanism for exploring meaningful, fundamental changes and solutions in aging services