WorkshopPEOPLE WITH DEMENTIA

Barbara SharpPractice Development Manager

Alzheimer Scotland

Scotland’s only national voluntary sector organisation specialising in

the support of people with dementia and their carers

Alzheimer Scotland

Aim to –

be the national and local voiceof people with dementia and their carers

to improve public policies

to provide and secure high quality services

Services …

• Day opportunities• Home support• Drop-in centres• Café (De- café)• Link workers and

outreach workers• Counselling• Support groups• Training for carers

• Specific services for specific groups of people – e.g. Younger people, Polish and Ukrainian community support

• Information• 24hr Helpline• Clinical Nurse Specialist• Welfare rights service• Palliative care projects

Understanding Dementia

Cognitive Impairment

Social Psychology

PhysicalHealth

Disability Personality

Environment

Biography

Approach

PersonDementiaEnvironment

Croftspar

Who Cares?The State of Dementia Care in

Scotland 2006

91% of carer respondents had to cope with severe behavioural symptoms such as aggression, personality changes and ‘wandering’

Perceptions of behaviour

• Previous life experience

• Relationships

• Personality

• Expectations

• Values

• Attitudes

• Environment

Focus of approaches

• COMMUNICATION• Relationships• Identity and self esteem• Emotions• Orientation and

reassurance• Stimulation• Acceptance• Assessment

• Avoid multiple stimuli• Predict and manage

‘stressors’• Prompt/maintain ADL

skills• Match capacity and pace• Discreet, subtle support• Analytical• Evidence based and• ‘Experimental’

Involvement and Learning

• Service users• Staff• Carers• Other services and

professionals

Partnership working

• Palliative care - ‘Beyond Barriers’ project

• Acute careClinical nurse specialistMaterials developed jointly - assessment;

training; guidance; profiles

• Volunteer befriending

• Involvement of carers in training

Real life scenarios

Miss Anderson has dementia and lives alone. Her sister stays nearby. Miss Anderson has recently taken to going out all day, every day, returning in the early evening obviously fairly exhausted. On inspection of these outings it appears that she has developed a routine of following a set path, frequenting several cafes en route. In each café she buys something to eat and chats to strangers. Her sister is extremely vexed at this situation (as Miss A would never normally have behaved like this and neighbours are phoning her) and she is concerned for her sister’s safety.

Real life scenarios

David has a frontal lobe dementia and resides in a care home. Staff are finding aspects of his behaviour very difficult to cope with and the family are constantly complaining to them (36 complaints made in one month) about the care he receives. The main difficulty is that he is never still – he walks and walks and walks. Everyone feels frustrated and lost about what to do.

Real life scenarios

Jenny was referred to our service from another local day care service where staff were finding that 2 staff had to be committed to her support on each visit to assist with mobility, eating and continence problems. Jenny was also described as disruptive and and verbally critical of other service users.

Real Life Scenarios

Margaret leaves her home and returns with goods from a local shop that she has not paid for. Her ‘shoplifting’ trips become a regular feature (totally out of character) much to the embarrassment of her husband and annoyance of the shopkeeper.

Supporting Good Practice

ToolsResources

RecruitmentInduction

ITP’sProf.

developmentInvolvement

Sharing

ContImprovement

StandardsAudit

PolicyProcess

SupportGuidance

LearningCulture

Good Practice

Staff Training

‘ We believe effective induction, training, support and development of staff are key factors in providing job satisfaction and achieving high quality service delivery to people with dementia and their carers’

“I feel doing my SVQ has given me more confidence in what I do and a better understanding of why I do things in a certain way. I think it makes me better at my job. I feel able to challenge things when I think something is wrong”J.A. Day Care OrganiserSVQ candidate

Key Principles

• Strong team approach

• Innovative and motivated staff

• Tolerance/acceptance

• Assessment

• Person centred/relationship approach

More than one way to look at things…

www.alzscot.org

Barbara Sharp

Practice Development Manager

Alzheimer Scotland

81 Oxford Street

Glasgow

G5 9EP

Phone: 0141 418 3935

Email: bsharp@alzscot.org