Cathy Cress

Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management

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How Can Reminiscence Give an Elder With Dementia a Happier Labor Day?

August 30, 2021

 

 

Even Elders with Dementia can Find New Joy with Reminiscence

Holidays are perfect for reminiscence or bringing back memories for someone who has dementia. Labor Day wascelebrated by them as a child.They may be able recall walking back to the first day of school , buying school supplies, or the taste of late summer tomatoes on hamburgers or ice cream at Labor Day barbecues with family.When an elderly person develops Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia, the short-term memory is frequently affected .But long-term memories , like childhood Labor Day memories ,can remain as intact and as vivid as they have always been during the course of the client’s  life.  As a result  healthcare professionals and family 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 ?

 Reminiscence happens when an older person spends time recalling memories of his or her life. If they suffer from dementia this can still happen. This Labor Day by asking, elders who were kids in the 40’s , 50’s &60’s ,about how they celebrated Labor Day in that era, prompts them to recall with their long term memory that is often still intact.

Care managers and senior professionals can coach family to use photos, familiar objects, or other items to help jog the memory of the elder. Families can get out scrapbooks of a person’s life, including  old photos, letters, and other such personal memorabilia.If you have old family movies, or DVD’s that  can evoke good recall. This becomes a  visual biography of the elder’s  life and helps him or her remember who he or she is.Plus actually interacting or spending time and talking to and listening to older friends and family , who are often isolated and very lonely, can bring real  joy to their lives. 

How Does Quality of Life Therapy Help Any Older Person?

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

HOW DOES REMINISCENCE THERAPY HELP DEMENTIA

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.

Books to Help You Open Your Own Program

Geriatric Care Manager Nina Herndon is the pioneer of adding reminiscence therapy to geriatric care management. She authored the chapter Quality of Life in Handbook of Geriatric Care Management .

Nina also created a book on quality of life activities you can use in your work and program called Joyful Moments 

 

 

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Filed Under: Aging Family, aging life care manager, Blog, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Holiday Rituals in Aging Family, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Quality of Life, Quality of Life for elders, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminiscence Therapy Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging life or geriatric care manager, aging parent care, care manager, case manager, geriatric care manager, Labor Day & Reminicance, Labor Day barbecue, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Reminicence & 4th of July, Reminicence and Dementia, Reminicence and geriatric care manager, Reminicence Therapy, Reminiscence on the Holidays, stress free Labor Day, team planning for Labor Day

4 Reminicence Holiday Activities for Dementia Using the Four Senses

December 10, 2019

 

Looking for dementia activities?

Reminiscence activities provide a way for caregivers or care managers of people with dementia to learn more about them as individuals and begin to see them beyond dementia. Compared to different activities like music, reading, task-oriented, activities that increase live social interaction with the senses have the most impact on effect in persons with dementia.

Reminiscence therapy is a treatment that uses all the senses — sight, touch, taste, smell, and sound — to help people with dementia remember events, people and places from their past lives. As part of the therapy, caregiver or care managers may use objects in various activities to help individuals with a recall of memories. This can give seniors with dementia a feeling of success and confidence because they are still able to recall and have success with some activities.

Reminiscence therapy can include simple activities, such as conversation, as well as more advanced clinical therapies to help bring memories from the distant past into present awareness. Storytelling about past events they recall through the senses can help people with dementia feel less isolated and more connected to the present, experts say.

 

Some activities the can activate memory in different parts of the brain and help individuals with dementia to reminisce

  1. Looking through photos and keepsakes of prior holidays. Photographs are keepsakes because they bring back memories that help individuals recall- the place where the photo was taken, who was there, even the occasion where the photo was taken. The visual stimulates the part of the brain that holds that memory. Getting out old albums or high school yearbooks and looking at them with the person who has dementia can stimulate good feelings and a time when they were happy and safe.
  2. Listen to their favorite Hanaukka or Christmas music. Music memory and emotion are located in the brain right behind our forehead and are the last parts of the brain to atrophy. That’s why reminiscence is recommended with even the most advanced cases of dementia. If you do a quality of life assessment and find music as a form of joy in a person ‘s life, you can bring tambourines’ shakers or bells or use headphones that play their favorite music. Alive Inside is a famous example of this.
  3. Smell different scents and taste favorite foods. Our sense of smell is embedded in our brain next to memory. So some activities that might work with elders with dementia are making scent cards or  bringing scent bringing their favorite food to taste  like Hanukka Cookies decored holiday Christmas tree cupcakes  have them help prepare simple recipes
  4. Touch is another sense that evokes reminiscence is all of us but is really helpful with Dementia. Knitting, sewing or other crafts in a quality of life assessment show a past skill. Just touching yarn or fabric can bring back memory A walk in the woods or the beach or bringing them to the client with dementia, with a shell from the shore sand, seaweed or keep, bark from a tree, pine needles, pine cones can replicate the touch of these places  

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Family, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Blog, care manager, caregiver, Dementia Activities, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, Quality of Life for elders, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminiscence Therapy Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent care, assessing for quality of life, care manager, case manager, Dementia Activities, Dementia Quality of Life, emotional quality of life, Four senses dementia activities, nurse advocate, quality of life assessment, Reminicence and Dementia, reminicence and elder, Reminicence and geriatric care manager, Reminicence Therapy, reminin, Reminiscence and Dementia, reminiscence technology

Coming to you-Town Square- San Diego 50’s Fake town that Revolutionizes Reminiscence Therapy

September 23, 2018

Last week the Wall St Journal covered the most revolutionary version of Reminiscence therapy-  Town Square. Reminiscence therapy is a treatment that uses all the senses — sight, touch, taste, smell, and sound — to help people with dementia remember events, people and places from their past lives, just as Town Square does.

I took a tour of Town Square on Friday while attending the Western Regional Aging Life Conference in San Diego and it was at the same time mind boggling, fabulously fun and a trip back to my childhood in the 50’s.

The man who discovered the beta-amyloid plaques, George Glenner funded reminiscence therapy through Adult Daycare for 3 decades. His reminiscence legacy has exploded into Town Square, this fake 50’s town built for dementia sufferers so they can spend their day where their mind is calmest in their  50’s past.

Built by the San Diego opera the town has a  kitchen refrigerator like the one in my house in the early 50’s, a barbershop with Elvis hanging on the wall , a Malt shop called Rosie’s Dinner with jukebox, just like the ones my boyfriend Steve Paul and I played while we ate greasy french fries and mooned over each other in the early 60’s. Rosie’s has now collectible formica tables, with chrome chairs but that is a sturdy replica that seniors are safe in with added chrome arms.

https://cathycress.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/Rosey-dinner-.m4v

Town Square Rosie’s acts as act as a lunch spot for the 90 participants, spilling out into the patio.

It has a garage with a luscious, shiny black T  bird from the early fifties with gleaming chrome, my dream car when I was in Atlantic City High School.

Not only in this open for the last month but they rent it out for corporate events for fifties parties where everyone can dress up like Mad men and women in those divine 50’s dresses that I still lust for. And on top of this Town Square will franchise and its next ideation will appear in Baltimore

I came home hearing Patti Page sing Old Cape Cod , thinking of 1956 when I discovered Elvis, puberty, boys, small breasts, adolescence and wildly danced the jitterbug in Lou Molinari garage with all my friends, my life exploding. I was there again and felt glorious just like the lucky residents of Town Square.

 

 

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Filed Under: Aging Family, aging family crisis, aging life business, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Blog, care manager, caregiver, case manager, Dementia Activities, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, Quality of Life for elders, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminiscence Therapy, Town Hall Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent care, Alzheimers, assessing for quality of life, care manager, case manager, Dementia Activities, Dementia Quality of Life, emotional quality of life, Four senses dementia activities, George Brenner, nurse advocate, quality of life assessment, Reminicence and Dementia, reminicence and elder, Reminicence Therapy, Town Square

4 Reminicence Quality of Life Activities for Dementia Using the Four Senses

July 5, 2018

Happy Asian family

Looking for dementia activities? Reminiscence activities provide a way for caregivers or care managers of people with dementia to learn more about them as individuals and begin to see them beyond dementia. Compared to different activities like music, reading, task-oriented, activities that increase live social interaction with the senses have the most impact on effect in persons with dementia.

Reminiscence therapy is a treatment that uses all the senses — sight, touch, taste, smell, and sound — to help people with dementia remember events, people and places from their past lives. As part of the therapy, caregiver or care managers may use objects in various activities to help individuals with a recall of memories. This can give seniors with dementia a feeling of success and confidence because they are still able to recall and have success with some activities.

Reminiscence therapy can include simple activities, such as conversation, as well as more advanced clinical therapies to help bring memories from the distant past into present awareness. Storytelling about past events they recall through the senses can help people with dementia feel less isolated and more connected to the present, experts say.

 

Some activities the can activate memory in different parts of the brain and help individuals with dementia to reminisce are

  1. Looking through photos and keepsakes. Photographs are keepsakes because they bring back memories that help individuals recall- the place where the photo was taken, who was there, even the occasion where the photo was taken. The visual stimulates the part of the brain that holds that memory. Getting out old albums or high school yearbooks and looking at them with the person who has dementia can stimulate good feelings and a time when they were happy and safe.
  2. Listen to their favorite music. Music memory and emotion are located in the brain right behind our forehead and are the last parts of the brain to atrophy. That’s why reminiscence is recommended with even the most advanced cases of dementia. If you do a quality of life assessment and find music as a form of joy in a person ‘s life, you can bring tambourines’ shakers or bells or use headphones that play their favorite music. Alive Inside is a famous example of this.
  3. Smell different scents and taste favorite foods. Our sense of smell is embedded in our brain next to memory. So some activities that might work with elders with dementia are making scent cards or  bringing scent bringing their favorite food to taste or having them help prepare food
  4. Touch is another sense that evokes reminiscence is all of us but is really helpful with Dementia. Knitting, sewing or other crafts in a quality of life assessment show a past skill. Just touching yarn or fabric can bring back memory A walk in the woods or the beach or bringing them to the client with dementia, with a shell from the shore sand, seaweed or keep, bark from a tree, pine needles, pine cones can replicate the touch of these places 

    Happy Asian family

     

Filed Under: Aging Family, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Blog, care manager, caregiver, Dementia Activities, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, Quality of Life for elders, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminiscence Therapy Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent care, assessing for quality of life, care manager, case manager, Dementia Activities, Dementia Quality of Life, emotional quality of life, Four senses dementia activities, nurse advocate, quality of life assessment, Reminicence and Dementia, reminicence and elder, Reminicence Therapy

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