Zemplee CEO Aparna Pujar talks about the study behind two 2026 McKnight's Tech Awards golds: A "Nursing home without walls" concept that helped older adults in rural Kansas stay safely at home, and cut skilled nursing bed days by 50%. Zemplee's tech is a peek into a future where senior care moves to people's homes.

Learn more about Zemplee at zemplee.com.

Most advice about what to look for in dementia care comes from clinicians or from families. Khatera Bahadory has been both. She arrived from Kabul at ten, worked as a caregiver while putting herself through nursing school, and now directs Astoria Park Senior Living in Pasadena, California. Then her father-in-law was diagnosed with dementia, and she spent that period on the family side of the desk — frustrated by a care team whose communication, she says, simply wasn't there.She now uses that frustration as training material. With host Aparna Pujar, founder and CEO of Zemplee, she covers how she trains her team for sundowning, why every family gets the same standard of care regardless of how often they visit, and what she would change about aging in America.Visit: astoriaparkseniorliving.comzemplee.com

Jackie Hess spent 15 years in elder care and hospice before founding Stay Home Solutions, a Michigan-based service pairing certified home safety inspections with AI-powered passive remote monitoring. In this conversation, Jackie and Aparna dig into why families resist wearable fall pendants, how passive sensor data (not cameras) can protect privacy while still keeping families informed, and the most overlooked home safety fix that costs almost nothing: lighting.

Every hospital leader claims AI is transforming care. But how do you tell what's actually working from what's just hype?

Joe Avelino is CEO of College Medical Center, a behavioral health and acute care hospital in Long Beach, California, with a dedicated geriatric psychiatric program for older adults. He's also been a nurse, a soldier, and a hospital executive — and it shows in how he thinks about leadership.

In this episode, Joe walks through where College Medical Center actually stands with AI: the specific tools they're testing (from AI-assisted documentation in Cerner to an AI-generated plan of correction), how he separates real efficiency gains from tools that just move a metric, and how he leads a clinical staff through the skepticism and fear that come with any new technology.

Private equity and chain ownership have reshaped much of the nursing home industry over the last decade — but Maplewood Sauk Prairie has stayed locally owned since 1971. In this episode, administrator Carol Wilkes joins Zemplee CEO Aparna Pujar to talk about what independent ownership actually means for day-to-day care, whether it's a viable model for the future of senior care, and what families should look for when evaluating their options.

Family caregivers in America provided nearly 50 billion hours of unpaid care in 2024, worth over a trillion dollars if paid at market rates, exceeding annual Medicaid spending. In this episode, Rita Choula, Senior Director of Caregiving at AARP's Public Policy Institute, shares her personal caregiving journey and breaks down the findings of AARP's Valuing the Invaluable 2026 report. We discuss why caregiving hours are rising, the financial toll on families, and what policies, from caregiver tax credits to paid family leave, could ease the burden on the millions holding up this critical, often invisible, infrastructure.

Medication mistakes are the leading cause of hospitalization among older adults — and in rural communities, there's often no one nearby to catch them. In this episode, Ishanya sits down with Lisa Lavin, founder and CEO of Ōmcare, whose Ōmcare Home Health Hub combines autonomous medication dispensing with two-way video to connect seniors, family caregivers, and clinicians from wherever they are. Lisa shares what a missed $4 pill can cost a rural family, and why she believes aging at home is a right — not a luxury.

Visit Ōmcare: https://omcare.com

Nobody's saying the quiet part loud: AI won't fix healthcare if we just use it to do the same things faster. The real opportunity — and the real risk — is whether mission-driven organizations get ahead of it or get left behind. 

In this episode, Ishanya is joined by Ramon Llamas, strategist, operator, and author of the Flip a Switch blog, alongside Zemplee CEO Aparna Pujar, for a wide-ranging conversation about AI, health equity, and what's actually at stake for nonprofits, caregivers, and the aging population. 

Follow Ramon Llamas at his blog, Flip a Switch.

Boredom in dementia care isn't just uncomfortable — it shows up as agitation, withdrawal, and behaviors that too often lead to medication. Angela Fairhurst, founder of Geri-Gadgets, found a better way. After a winding caregiving journey with her own mother, she designed a line of sensory tools built specifically for aging hands, aging eyes, and aging dignity. In this episode, she and host Ishanya Anthapur explore how 15 minutes of meaningful engagement can change the entire chemistry of a day. 
 

Link: www.geri-gadgets.com

Listeners can get a 10% discount on Geri-Gadgets: use the code CARE10.

What does it take to lead change in an industry squeezed on every side — fewer caregivers, tighter budgets, and more complex residents? Jenna Kilawee knows firsthand. As a licensed assisted living director at Episcopal Homes in Minnesota and a PhD candidate, she's spent her career working from the ground up — from dietary aide to CNA to executive leadership. In this episode, she shares how Episcopal Homes is partnering with the University of St. Thomas to study AI-powered monitoring as a tool for fall prevention, and why caring for staff is the secret to caring for residents.