Melissa Preston

Associate Executive Director
Rogue Valley Manor
Medford, OR
  • 144-J. Rural Life Plan Communities Can Address Provider Shortages

    • Wednesday, October 28, 2026

    8:30 – 9:30 a.m.

    144-J. Rural Life Plan Communities Can Address Provider Shortages

    Accessing quality and consistent primary care is increasingly difficult for older adults in rural areas, largely due to challenges associated with contracting, credentialing, workforce shortages, and sustaining geriatric-focused primary care. This session will explore how a life plan community addressed these challenges by establishing an on-site primary care clinic that integrates care across all its service levels. Presenters will outline the clinic’s development and explain how it addresses provider shortages and payer complexities, and enhances resident wellness. You’ll take away practical strategies for designing sustainable, resident-centered healthcare models that strengthen and improve access, continuity, and satisfaction. You’ll also appreciate the critical role partnerships play in supporting sustainable, resident-centered healthcare.

Nicole Pretre

President & Chief Executive Officer
Cedar Community
West Bend, WI
  • 26-C. Leveraging Your Leadership Team to Move the Needle on Benevolence

    • Sunday, October 25, 2026

    4:30 – 5:30 p.m.

    26-C. Leveraging Your Leadership Team to Move the Needle on Benevolence

    Everyone is a fundraiser. That’s the message of this session, which will help you support key strategic priorities in your senior living community by connecting donors, both emotionally and programmatically, to specific activities or divisions on your campus. Presenters will show you how to leverage the strategic vision of your board, executive team, divisional leaders, and key frontline staff to move the needle on benevolence. You’ll learn to build relationships with diverse team leaders across all care levels and lifestyle divisions, then work together to prioritize fundraising opportunities that align with donor interests and your strategic plan.

Louis Prues, MBA, DMin, PhD

Immediate Past Board Chair
Presbyterian Villages of Michigan
St. Clair Shores, MI
  • 29-F. Strengthen Your Board Through Planned Enrichment

    • Monday, October 26, 2026

    4:30 – 5:30 p.m.

    29-F. Strengthen Your Board Through Planned Enrichment

    Knowledgeable, experienced, and engaged board members are essential to the success of senior living organizations. Yet few board members arrive at their first board meeting with all the knowledge needed to fulfill their roles. This session will explore how one organization expanded board members’ capacity by dedicating the first 60-90 minutes of its bimonthly board meetings to a wide range of enrichment activities. Presenters will outline how they implemented the revised board agenda and how it improved the board’s effectiveness. You’ll learn strategies for assessing board members’ current knowledge and addressing gaps. Discover how enrichment sessions can strengthen your board and help its members become confident change agents and change makers.

Chris Pugliese

Head of Interoperability
MatrixCare
Morrisville, NC
  • 3-C. Unlocking the Power of Interoperability

    • Sunday, October 25, 2026

    4:30 – 5:30 p.m.

    3-C. Unlocking the Power of Interoperability

    As the country’s healthcare system becomes more interconnected, the need for interoperable data exchange across care settings has never been more critical. Yet interoperability is often hindered because its meaning and benefits are unclear to the providers who could gain the most from it. This session will clear up the confusion. Presenters will demonstrate the practical advantages of interoperability and help you assess your organization’s readiness to implement it. They’ll also offer practical strategies for connecting data systems, enabling seamless data exchange with other care settings, and supporting integrated workflows. You’ll learn how one organization used interoperability to transform its operations, boost staff morale, and strengthen referral networks.

Sean Purser

Chief Quality Officer
Atria Senior Living
Louisville, KY
  • 79-D. Future-Proof Your Organization with a Quality Framework

    • Monday, October 26, 2026

    8:30 – 9:30 a.m.

    79-D. Future-Proof Your Organization with a Quality Framework

    Investing in quality can future-proof your aging services organization against regulatory, reimbursement, and demographic changes. The reason is simple: Discerning consumers assess providers based on whether their quality is trustworthy and measurable. This session will highlight the quality metrics that matter most to consumers and families when selecting aging services providers. You’ll learn how to use a standardized quality framework to strengthen workforce culture, improve recruitment, and reduce turnover. You’ll also discover how your organization’s quality performance can set it apart in the marketplace, build robust referral pipelines, and expand partnerships. This is your chance to transform quality from a compliance requirement into a growth strategy.

Paula Rathgaber Gomez

Chief Experience Officer
Sequoia Living
San Francisco, CA
  • 135-B. Build Your Workforce by Improving the Employee Experience

    • Sunday, October 25, 2026

    2:45 – 3:45 p.m.

    135-B. Build Your Workforce by Improving the Employee Experience

    Senior living organizations are navigating a workforce environment marked by staffing shortages, rapid onboarding, rising recruitment costs, and shifting expectations among new and seasoned team members. This session will explore how thoughtful experience design and strategic technology use can reshape the employee experience and foster lasting commitment. Presenters will share workforce-strengthening strategies that adapt customer-experience methods to the aging services workplace. They’ll outline the advantages of treating employees as “internal customers” by offering internships, mentoring programs, community-building initiatives, data-driven coaching tools, and streamlined career pathways. You’ll learn practical steps to reduce turnover and make workforce investments more predictable and measurable, even with resource constraints.

Vic Rayner

Chair of the Global Ageing Network and CEO
National Care Forum
  • 150-P. Age Readiness: A Global Imperative

    • Saturday, October 24, 2026

    9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

    150-P. Age Readiness: A Global Imperative

    Join innovators, policymakers, researchers, and service providers for this full-day summit exploring how to build societies ready for longevity. The program will feature global perspectives and cross-disciplinary dialogue to help participants challenge traditional assumptions about ageing, explore emerging innovations and best practices, and identify opportunities to prepare organizations, communities, and societies for the realities and possibilities of demographic change. Don’t miss this opportunity to join colleagues from around the world as they explore innovative approaches to supporting lifelong wellness, creating age-ready environments, harnessing technology to transform the aging experience, sustaining high-quality care through workforce development, and advancing the policy changes needed to shape aging-friendly communities.

Daniel Reingold

Board Vice Chair
RiverSpring Living
Riverdale, NY
  • 35-L. Thriving Amid the Turbulence by Managing Change

    • Wednesday, October 28, 2026

    11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.

    35-L. Thriving Amid the Turbulence by Managing Change

    The aging services sector is facing upheaval that will inevitably affect the services we offer, the settings where we provide care, and the structure of our organizations. In response, we must be willing to abandon old approaches and rely on creativity, perseverance, and stakeholder engagement to chart a new course. During this lively, interactive discussion, two senior living leaders will introduce you to change management models and offer guidance on applying them in various situations. You’ll hear about organizations that couldn’t let go of the past and those that have made significant changes with meaningful results. Discover how to thrive amid the turbulence by understanding the changes and opportunities ahead and learning to manage them at a rapid pace.

Julian Reisenthel

Home Care Director
Full Life Care
Seattle, WA
  • 51-I. Surviving the HCBS Squeeze: Sustainability Solutions

    • Tuesday, October 27, 2026

    4:30 – 5:30 p.m.

    51-I. Surviving the HCBS Squeeze: Sustainability Solutions

    Sixty percent of home and community-based service (HCBS) providers have faced negative margins or program closures over the past three years because of stagnant reimbursement rates and rising costs. This session will offer several solutions to help your HCBS program survive the squeeze. Presenters will share how their agency navigated severe reimbursement challenges, made tough program decisions, and used innovative practices to restore its financial health. Discover how they implemented geographic clustering of clients to improve staffing efficiency and leveraged a remote global administrative workforce to reduce overhead. You’ll gain strategies to right-size your agency, maximize your bottom line, and better support clients and communities amid funding challenges.

David Richart

Executive Director
Full Life Care
Seattle, WA
  • 51-I. Surviving the HCBS Squeeze: Sustainability Solutions

    • Tuesday, October 27, 2026

    4:30 – 5:30 p.m.

    51-I. Surviving the HCBS Squeeze: Sustainability Solutions

    Sixty percent of home and community-based service (HCBS) providers have faced negative margins or program closures over the past three years because of stagnant reimbursement rates and rising costs. This session will offer several solutions to help your HCBS program survive the squeeze. Presenters will share how their agency navigated severe reimbursement challenges, made tough program decisions, and used innovative practices to restore its financial health. Discover how they implemented geographic clustering of clients to improve staffing efficiency and leveraged a remote global administrative workforce to reduce overhead. You’ll gain strategies to right-size your agency, maximize your bottom line, and better support clients and communities amid funding challenges.

Eric Riguerra, RN

Director of Nursing Services
Jewish Home at Rockleigh
Rockleigh, NJ
  • 113-E. Improving Dementia Care with AI-Powered Pain Assessment

    • Monday, October 26, 2026

    3:00 – 4:00 p.m.

    113-E. Improving Dementia Care with AI-Powered Pain Assessment

    Pain is often underrecognized and undertreated in older adults with dementia, many of whom cannot reliably self-report their discomfort. This communication barrier leads caregivers to rely on subjective observations, resulting in inconsistent assessments and missed opportunities for intervention. This session will explore how AI-powered pain assessment tools combine automated facial recognition with structured digital checklists to accurately and consistently identify pain-related behaviors in nonverbal individuals. Presenters will demonstrate how to use these tools to improve clinical decision-making and reduce falls, frailty, and inappropriate drug use. Join this session to discover how technology and human care can work together to ensure a pain-free future for older adults.

Keith Robinette

Career Coach
Givens Communities
Asheville, NC
  • 145-K. Growing From Within: The Power of Career Coaching

    • Wednesday, October 28, 2026

    10:00 – 11:00 a.m.

    145-K. Growing From Within: The Power of Career Coaching

    When team members see a future for themselves at your organization, they will stay, grow, and thrive. This session will show you how in-house career coaching makes that possible by establishing clear career pathways, building trust-based coaching relationships, and supporting skill development. Presenters will outline a scalable career-coaching model used by a life plan community to foster workforce engagement, increase retention, and improve organizational culture. You’ll gain tools to build your own coaching program, including strategies for identifying champions, defining success metrics, and embedding coaching into everyday workflows. Don’t miss this opportunity to create a future where every team member thrives.