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How Story Telling Can Give Elders with Dementia a Better Quality of Life

March 31, 2018

 

Want to increase and elder’s quality of life. Try story telling.

As an aging professional, you can bring joy to an older person  through reminiscence, story telling and oral history even elders with dementia

 Just like storytelling helps children look forward to life- what is fun, what is scary, what never to do, it helps elders look back on their life. It gives both older and kids people a chance to socialize as they tell their story. The “telling ” also means someone usually listens or documents. That magically gives the elder and a child social interaction and connectedness. Elders vividly recall their past by telling from vignettes in their life – especially life in their 20’s, which sparks the richest recall called the “20’s bump”, according to researchers.

Elders sharing stories means passing on history, so it becomes intergenerational. The older person is given a chance to give the larger picture of their life and family history to children and grandchildren or extended family, who may not have heard all the details of their grandparents or parents life before. So a dual dose of quality of the older person of both the older person and the aging family is increased through oral history and reminiscence

An  aging professional, like a geriatric care manager, can suggest family or friends just sitting down and prompting a story or oral history using  technology like an i Phone or i Pad 

Even elders with Alzheimer’s can find new joy with Reminiscence

When an elderly person develops Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia, the short-term memory is frequently affected but long-term memories can remain as intact and as vivid as they have always been during the course of the patient’s life.. As a result  healthcare professionals can use a practice called reminiscence therapy to help combat the frustration, confusion, and depression that can often accompany dementia and even bring joy to the older person

What is reminiscence therapy?

 Reminiscence therapy is like a therapy session where the elderly person will spend time recalling memories of his or her life, perhaps telling stories about things that happened and events the person can recall.

Care managers and senior professionals can use photos, familiar objects, or other such items to help jog the memory of the elder. Some therapists can a scrapbook of a person’s life, including photos, letters, and other such personal memorabilia. This becomes a  visual biography of the patient’s life and helps him or her remember who he or she is.

How does this quality of life therapy help? Almost all elderly men and women can feel deeply discouraged and frustrated with their memory issues. Reminiscence can give peace and acceptance of the current situation by helping the person remember that he or she has had a good and full life.It also prompts communication skills of elderly people who otherwise may not feel very compelled to open up and share anything with anyone else.

Using Reminiscence therapy techniques can give the confused elder a richer quality of life by giving them with time with other people who will actually listen to them.  Through this, a  dementia patient is made to feel their thoughts and feelings actually matter. To someone who has an elderly loved one suffering from dementia, this benefit alone can make reminiscence therapy a form of joy.

There is even an app called Grey Matters, which caregivers and care managers can look into for reminiscence therapy for elders with dementia. If the senior is a BBC fan, like me, the BBC even has an app called RemArc  to help dementia sufferers with reminiscence using old clips from the BBC. You can see in the future an app that has clips from Star Wars for present baby boomers or generations after that.

 

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Family, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, care manager, case manager, elder care manager, geriatric care manager, geriatric social worker, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, Quality of Life for elders, Reminiscence Therapy Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent, aging parent care, aging technology, ancrestory.com, assessing for quality of life, care manager, care plan, care plan interventions, case manager, family caregivers, Family Caregivers using technology, genealogy, geriatric care management, geriatric care manager, geritaric care manager, grandfather, grandmothers, grandparents, increasing quality of life, LCSW, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, oral history, oral history and quality of life, oral history and You Tube, parent care, Quality of Life, quality of life assessment, reminicence and elder, reminisicsence technology, story telling elders, storytelling and elders, technology for caregivers, You Tube, You Tube and storytelling

Technology That Supports the Client- How and What?

June 11, 2015

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Aging life and geriatric Care managers must challenge themselves to think about a new paradigm of caregiving for elders that includes technology-based tools.  In order to be able to recommend products for a client, the care manager should be aware of and be willing to experiment with currently available products.  It is also important for the care manager to have a process based upon specific criteria to “evaluate technology.  GCM Julie Menack co author of the new chapter Technologies That Support Aging in Place,in the 4th edition of Handbook of Geriatric Care Management suggest you use these benchmarks

·      Efficacy—Does the technology perform substantially according to expectations?

·      Return on investment and cost effectiveness—Does the end result justify the means?

·      Ease of use—Do the care providers, family members, or elders using the technology day to day find it intuitive and user-friendly?

·      Low maintenance—Does the solution require significant time and resources to maintain?

·      Improved accountability—Does the solution help the care provider to improve accountability and quality of care?

·      Connection, Contribution, or Legacy? – Does the technology support the client’s feeling of contribution and connection to their family, community, or society?  Does the technology allow the client to transmit their experiences to future generations?

Filed Under: Aging Tagged With: aging in place technolofy, aging technology, Center for Aging and Technology, geriatric care management technology, technology for caregivers

NPR Science Friday- Fixes Seniors and Technology

May 24, 2013

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NPR’s Science Friday had an a fabulous info segment today on seniors and technology. It covers the good, the bad and the ugly about what is available to older people who were not born playing with I phones. They (that’s me) live in a bilingual world where they did not grow up speaking/playing with the language of technology- plus they have disabilities. All of us who have grandchildren (and I remind everyone all the time – I have 10)- knows this. My 2 year old twin grandson’s run circles around me and my 27 year old runs my web site, does my SEO and literally is my tech brain. Tune in to the science of seniors on the steroids of technology – and how the Dollar Store can help you with your I Pad – no kidding.Also,great information from the OATS program – Older Adults in Technology-in New York.

 

Filed Under: Aging Tagged With: aging parent care, assessing for quality of life, checklist for aging parent problems, Funtional Assessment, geraitric care manager, grandchildren, nano-technology, National Association of Geriatric Care Managers, NPR, Older Adults Technology Services, Science Friday, Skype, smartphones for seniors, support of grandmothers, teaching technology to seniors, technology for caregivers, technology for telephones for elderly, techology and seniors, telecare, telecare systems, telehealth

New York Times -Robots in Future of Aging ?

May 20, 2013

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Robot and Frank was one my favorite 2012 aging films. Frank, a master burglar is presented a robot by his overwrought, burnt out adult son. Frank has early dementia. He hates the robot but trains him to increase his quality of life, which is returning to his career- grand theft. This New York Times article has a different story about robots – but a similar vein. They meet a need. There are less adult children and caregivers to care for the elderly and more and more older adults – and thus – the niche market for robots .

Filed Under: Aging Tagged With: ADLs, aging adults living together, aging family, Aging In Place, aging parent, aging parent care, aging parent crisis, aging technology, assessing for quality of life, caregiver stress, Frank Langella, geriatric care managers, long distance caregiver, Marriage and Family Therapist, National Association of Geriatric Care Managers, New York Times, parent care, Quality of Life, rejected care plan, Robot and Frank, robots, robots and aging, technology for caregivers, telehealth

Can Someone with Demetia Really have a better quality of Life

April 8, 2013

PDF-Cover-of-11-10-12My-Geriatric-Care-Management-Agency.jpg

Reminiscence and Story Telling

As an aging professional you can increase an older person’s quality of life through reminiscence, story telling and oral history

The role of story telling and reminiscence is very important for elders, as they look back on their life. It gives them a chance to socialize as they tell their story. It also means someone usually listens or documents. That magically  gives the elder social interaction and connectiveness.

Elders sharing stories means passing on history, which gives the older person a chance to give the larger picture of their life and family history to children and grandchildren or extended family, who may have not heard all the details of their grandparents or parents life before. So the quality of the older person of both the older person and the aging family are increased through oral history and reminiscence

The aging professional can suggest family or friends just sitting down and prompting a story or oral history using  technology like flip video camera, or You Tube

Even elders with Alzheimers can find new joy with Reminicence

When an elderly person develops Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia, the short-term memory is frequently affected but long-term memories can remain as intact and vivid as they have always been during the course of the patient’s life.. As a result  healthcare professionals can use  practice called reminiscence therapy to help combat the frustration, confusion, and depression that can often accompany dementia and even bring joy to the older person

What is reminiscence therapy?

 Reminiscence therapy is like a therapy session where the elderly person will spend time recalling memories of his or her life, perhaps telling stories about things that happened and events the person can recall.

Sometimes senior experts can use photos, familiar objects, or other such things to help jog the memory of the patient. Some therapists can a scrapbook of a person’s life, including photos, letters, and other such personal memorabilia. This becomes a s visual biography of the patient’s life and helps him or her remember who he or she is.

How does this quality of life therapy help? Almost all elderly men and women can  start feeling discouraged and frustrated with their memory issues. Reminicence can give  peace and acceptance of the current situation by helping the person remember that he or she has had a good and full life  life.It also prompts  communication skills of elderly people who otherwise may not feel very compelled to open up and share anything with anyone else.

People with dementia can get given a richer quality of life  by giving  them with time with other people who will actually listen to them, so that the dementia patients are made to feel as if their thoughts and feelings actually matter. To someone who has an elderly loved one suffering from dementia, this benefit alone can make reminiscence therapy a formr of joy for a very cobfused elder

 

Filed Under: Aging Tagged With: aging family, aging parent, aging parent care, aging technology, ancrestory.com, assessing for quality of life, care plan, care plan interventions, family caregivers, Family Caregivers using technology, flip video, genealogy, geriatric care management, geriatric care manager, geritaric care manager, grandfather, grandmothers, grandparents, increasing quality of life, LCSW, oral history, oral history and quality of life, oral history and You Tube, parent care, Quality of Life, quality of life assessment, reminicence and elder, storytelling and elders, technology for caregivers, You Tube, You Tube and storytelling

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Cathy Cress is the leading national expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management. She is author of Handbook of Geriatric Care Management 4th edition, Jones and Bartlett, published 2015 and known as the bible of geriatric care management. Continue Reading >

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