Posted on Fri 8th Feb, 2019 in: Dementia Design, Dementia Friendly Environments, Dementia Friendly Products
Using design to compensate for reduced ability to navigate spaces This article from The Guardian from last year gives an insight into the issues that people living with dementia experience around navigation. In it, Wendy Mitchell – who was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s 4 years ago at the age of 58 – describes the difficulties that she has with finding her way around...
Posted on Mon 28th Jan, 2019 in: Dementia Design, Dementia Friendly Environments, Dementia Friendly Products
When your mum thinks you’re someone they went to school with, how can we expect them to recognise themselves? There is a video doing the rounds on social media that shows a son filming his mother, who is living with dementia, during a trip out to a restaurant. He is shown asking her who she thinks his mum is and who she thinks he is. She can’t answer the questions and ...
Posted on Fri 18th Jan, 2019 in: Dementia Design, Dementia Friendly Environments, Dementia Friendly Products
Trips and falls are a big problem for older people and can have significant consequences. Fall prevention is something that all care environments try hard to implement but the risk of a fall increases greatly in those living with dementia. This risk is predominantly due to the decline in visuoperceptual abilities. People with dementia are often not able to perceive things accurate...
Posted on Mon 26th Nov, 2018 in: Dementia Design, Dementia Friendly Environments, Dementia Friendly Products
A recent article in The Care Home Environment Magazine by Peter Rose, the owner of The Care Home Designer, discusses seven key elements that are fundamentally important to how well a care home will function. These elements are colour schemes, themes, wayfinding, personalisation, destinations, lighting and toilets/bathrooms. We were particularly interested in what he had to say about wayfin...
Posted on Fri 26th Oct, 2018 in: Dementia Friendly Environments, Dementia Friendly Products
Don’t we have a responsibility to find an alternative rather than just take something away? Often the everyday items that surround us can become inappropriate for people with dementia due to the risk of harm or the distress that they can cause. Obviously if this is the case then it wouldn’t be appropriate to ignore these items, knowing their effects could be detrimenta...