Why Leafnotes exists

Leafnotes didn't start as a care management system.

It started with dementia, and the personal experience of Adam, our CTO & Co-founder, whose nan lived with the condition for years before she passed.

Our first work was in automated reminiscence therapy, using technology to help people living with dementia reconnect with their own memories: the music, places and people that shaped them. It's the reason we still run the Fighting Dementia podcast. One day we want our platform to support families affected by dementia too.

That early work led to Lola, our digital companion, and the first results in social care have stayed with us.

A man living with an acquired brain injury began talking with Lola about his poetry, in more depth than he had before. After five sessions, he was out of the home and on a writing course. A child who loved plants talked about them at length and went on to learn about careers in science. An older gentleman reminisced about his years in manufacturing, going into real detail about the machines, factories and processes he had worked with around the world.

Each of them had something they cared about deeply, and it just needed space. That left us with a question we're still asking today.

How do people who need long term care and support thrive in the world?

Can they explore their hobbies and interests in depth? Can they be economically active? Can they keep learning and growing?

When we came into the sector, there didn't seem to be much space for that question.

On one side was a mountain of paperwork, often held in systems that were difficult to work with. On the other were systems where you click buttons to show basic care has been delivered, and very little gets captured about the person or their family: their ongoing wishes, their desires, how they're feeling.

Neither left much room for the person's own voice.

That's why we built Leafnotes.

To give time and energy back to social care organisations, providing them with unique tools that can help the people they support to not just survive, but thrive.

We developed it alongside support workers and managers across 10 different types of social care setting, from children's homes to supported living to specialist mental health homes. From day one, it has been shaped by people who do this work every day. We wanted to lift the admin weight that keeps support workers and managers at a screen.

That time can go into the outcomes, hopes, dreams and opportunities the people you support could grasp. A conversation about a new interest. A plan for a first job. A record a young person would read and recognise as themselves.

Six months into starting the company, we put our values on the wall. They're still there: Caring, People First, Committed, Healthy, Positive.

They've guided our decisions since, from the early reminiscence work to the product we have today.

We still believe what we believed at the start. Keeping people safe is essential, and it's where good care begins.

We'd like to help the sector go further, so that people who need long term support have the chance to live a life that feels like their own.

If you're asking the same question in your organisation, I'd love to hear how you're approaching it.