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In Press Release

Promise Pointe Celebrates Anniversary with Local, International Partners

Temple Terrace, Fla., April 4, 2019 – Promise Pointe at Tampa Oaks is celebrating a year of international partnerships, innovative collaborations and top-notch care for its residents.

“It has been a great year,” said President and CEO Kirk Eicholtz. “We have had the opportunity to serve so many wonderful individuals and to work with numerous organizations locally, nationally and internationally. This celebratory milestone is the first of many as Promise Pointe continues to grow and lead in the senior living industry.”

The Temple Terrace assisted living and Alzheimer’s and dementia care community first opened its doors in April 2018. Promise Pointe marked its first anniversary with a ceremony at the community Wednesday, April 3.

In celebration of this milestone both memory care and assisted living residents were given the honor  of cutting two Promise Pointe anniversary cakes at the ceremony.

“Our residents are what this is all about,” said Charles Trefzger, CEO of Affinity Living Group, the management company for Promise Pointe. “We wanted to honor our residents, along with their families, when marking this anniversary and celebrating such a great year. They really enjoyed being in the spotlight for that special moment.”

For Joanna Thompson whose mother, Betty, has been a resident at Promise Pointe since it opened last April, this moment was incredibly special.

“For me, it’s just been a peace of mind knowing the staff here, how much they look after my mom especially after she lost my dad in July,” Thompson said at the ceremony. “They treat her like she’s their grandmother and I couldn’t ask for any more from any of the staff here – it’s a wonderful place.”

Event attendees included the residents, staff, executive leaders, and business and community partners.

Throughout their first operational year, Promise Pointe has proven to be an innovative leader in the senior care industry, piloting first-of-their-kind programs and establishing partnerships with key organizations.

“The team at Promise Pointe has accomplished extraordinary things in a relatively brief period of time,” said Dr. Kevin O’Neil, chief medical officer for ALG. “State-of-the-art wellness programs have been implemented, and through an affiliation with the University of South Florida, residents may participate in groundbreaking research that has the potential to improve the quality of life of older adults and their families.”

Among its many collaborative efforts, Promise Pointe works with various colleges and professors at the University of South Florida. One initiative that Promise Pointe is pursuing with the University concerns research already underway at  USF’s School of Aging Studies College of Behavioral and Community Sciences on the benefits of music therapy for older adults.

“Music programs can be powerful tools for providers of long-term services and supports,” said Dr. Hongdao Meng, an Associate Professor in the School of Aging Studies at USF. “This is just one exciting program Promise Pointe is working on in their first year, and I am looking forward to collaborating with the community to implement this program.”

USF Health Byrd Alzheimer’s Center at the USF Health Neuroscience Institute also works with Promise Pointe to provide community Alzheimer’s support groups.

“I am happy to be celebrating this milestone alongside Promise Pointe,” said Eileen Poiley, Director of Education at the USF Health Byrd Alzheimer’s Center at the USF Health Neuroscience Institute. “I am pleased to have had the opportunity to work with them throughout this past year to offer a monthly support group for Alzheimer’s family caregivers, and I look forward to our future collaborations.”

Promise Pointe is also in discussion with other colleges and schools within USF about potential collaborative endeavors and opportunities for USF students to receive hands-on training as clinicians within the Promise Pointe community.

“I am grateful that Promise Pointe is a welcoming clinical training site for our health professions students,” said Dr. Kathryn Hyer, said Kathryn Hyer, PhD, MPP, Professor Director, Florida Policy Exchange Center on Aging Associate Director, School of Aging Studies. “This milestone is worth celebrating, especially for such a forward-thinking community like Promise Pointe.”

Promise Pointe has also partnered with with the MOTION PT Group to have a full time physical therapist on site.

“We are very excited about our partnership with Promise Pointe at Tampa Oaks, and we believe it is the ideal senior living community to launch this industry-leading Ortho Road to Recovery Program,” said National Co-Director of MOTION PT Group Senior Care Services Kevin Krueger. “This month marks the one-year anniversary of Promise Pointe, and we at the MOTION PT Group are thrilled to celebrate alongside them.”

Promise Pointe and its leaders are excited to not only celebrate a year of success, but also to continue to grow and develop these business and community relationships that help to make Promise Pointe an exceptional assisted living and memory care community.

For more information about Promise Pointe, call (813) 694-2153 or visit PromisePointeSeniorLiving.com.

 

For more information on this press release, contact Tiffany Fields, Communications Manager, at tfields@affinitylivinggroup.com or (828) 442-3621.

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About Promise Pointe at Tampa Oaks

Promise Pointe at Tampa Oaks is an exceptional choice for assisted living and Alzheimer’s and dementia care in a refreshingly convenient location off Interstate 75 in Temple Terrace, Florida. At Promise Pointe Senior Living, a dedication to helping each individual live the highest quality of life is exemplified by exceptional care and attention, beautiful architecture and natural surroundings, and an enriching and inspiring ambiance.

 

Photos by Elizabeth Romine/Promise Pointe

Two women standing by a cakePromise Pointe resident Betty LaBarbera and her daughter Joanna Thompson had the honor of cutting a celebratory cake to mark the community’s first anniversary.

From the left, Promise Pointe President and CEO Kirk Eicholtz smile for a photo with Beth Anderson and Kevin Kruger, representatives from NEXT Therapy Solutions.

Resident Hazel, left, and her daughter, Phyllis, enjoyed celebrating Promise Pointe’s anniversary with friends.

In News, Press Release

Assisted living community offers USF students real-world experience

University of South Florida Physician Assistant students now have the opportunity to gain hands-on experience with patients before they enter the field for clinical training, thanks to a new partnership with Promise Pointe at Tampa Oaks, the area’s newest and finest assisted living community.

“We are excited to be collaborating with USF to help provide a senior care community where students in medical programs can participate in research projects and quality improvement programs at our state-of-the-art facility,” said Kirk D. Eicholtz, president and CEO of Christian Tyler Properties, owner of Promise Pointe. “We have an extraordinary opportunity to combine the great academic work being done at USF with a practical, hands-on, real world experience in day-to-day senior living and geriatric care.”

While the partnership opens the doors for other medical programs at USF, the inaugural group of students will be first-year Physician Assistant (PA) program participants. These students will have the opportunity to meet with willing residents at the Promise Pointe community and conduct an interview to collect a complete medical history for the resident.

“First-year [PA] students have not interviewed real life patients yet, that generally comes the second year of their curriculum,” said Jennifer Teeters, Assistant Professor of the Physician Assistant program at USF Morsani College of Medicine.  “We don’t want their first exposure with a real-life patient to come then. This particular facility gives them an opportunity to talk to what is likely a complex patient, take a comprehensive medical history and really get their feet wet. It really bridges the gap between our first- and second-year transition.”

Teeters added that residents at an assisted living community provide a more accurate picture of the types of patients students are likely to see in the field, given that older adults often face more medical challenges than those who are younger.

“It’s more realistic. Generally speaking, people that go to their family medicine practitioner  are going to have more medical conditions versus a healthy individual,” Teeters explained. “As a health care practitioner, you may only see patients ages 30 and under once a year for their annual physical, which is pretty easy. In terms of someone a little older, you have the opportunity to take histories on people with the possibility of several medical conditions where you don’t always get to the see that.”

Interviewing aging adults, Teeters said, also pushes students to begin thinking about different types of home accommodations for physical and medical needs of their patients, providing another unique educational opportunity.

“Assisted living facilities can offer unique living situations,” Teeters said. “Students can start thinking about working with home accommodations. Some may have some memory problems or more advanced aging problems. This is just a great opportunity to further these students’ knowledge base prior to entering their clinical rotations — we need facilities like this.”

For Promise Pointe, the partnership offers an opportunity to help train the students who will be caring for seniors as professionals, both in the Promise Pointe community and across the industry as a whole.

“The synergy that will be created by this affiliation will further prepare the students to be ready for the professional world as soon as they graduate from one of these Colleges at USF,” Eicholtz said. “Our primary goal with this relationship is to help improve the study of aging sciences for not only our residents and families living at Promise Pointe, but throughout our community sharing our best practices for use with future generations of students and our seniors.”

Leadership at Affinity Living Group (ALG), the management company for Promise Pointe, share Eicholtz’ excitement for the partnership and its benefits for the future of senior care.

“We have an extraordinary opportunity to expose students to wonderful experiences in senior living and geriatric care,” said Dr. Kevin O’Neill, chief medical officer for ALG. “Students will learn to apply what they have studied in an academic setting to the reality of an assisted living setting.  There is an urgent national need for more geriatric care workers and leaders.  Hopefully, this experience will encourage more young men and women to pursue careers in senior living and geriatric care.”

The number of people over age 65 is expected to double by 2030, said ALG President and CEO Charles Trefzger, Jr. This “silver tsunami” is something the senior care industry is preparing for, Trefzger said.

“With the USF partnership, Promise Pointe will play an important role in training the next generation of geriatric practitioners,” Trefzger said. “It’s a win-win. Our residents will benefit from the time and attention of the PA students, who in turn will benefit from the hands-on experience – learning the real, day-to-day needs of senior citizens at an assisted living community.”

Promise Pointe at Tampa Oaks is an assisted living community owned by Christian Tyler Properties and managed by Affinity Living Group. To learn more, visit the Promise Pointe website at temporarydev.promisepointeseniorliving.com.