By Helen Bate B.A.Dip.Arch.B.A.(Hons)

With funding from a number of national charities including the Alzheimer’s Society and the Andrews Charitable Trust, Helen has worked for the last five years researching, designing and publishing books for people with dementia...

The challenge of providing good person centred care
Dementia care homes face huge challenges in providing good person-centred care. Successfully providing a wide range of stimulating and enjoyable activities for residents requires time, money, effort and imagination.

Some resources are dependent on specialist equipment and many can only be used with a large time input from staff that is often not available.

Many care homes are aware of Reminiscence Therapy and use old photographs and household items in regular activity sessions to get residents talking about their memories. So what is Book Therapy and what can it offer?

Providing books that people with dementia can actively enjoy can renew an interest in books and ‘reading’ that many thought they had lost. But it can do more than this. It can also encourage meaningful communication about a range of subjects including very individual and personal memories and feelings, and it can prompt laughter and a sense of well-being. 

Powerful images that are not completely based on reminiscence can show topics that everybody can relate to, so residents, carers and visitors can all enjoy looking at them, whatever their age or background.

When care staff can spend even a small amount of time looking through a book with a resident with dementia, it helps to improve the activity level for that resident. It also helps carers to understand the individual better, so improving the care they give.

So what books are suitable for people with mid to late stage dementia?
Because of the mistaken belief that people with dementia can’t read or enjoy books, there are very few suitable books around. It is possible to find ‘coffee table books’ full of beautiful photographs on a range of topics and sometimes these can be used successfully. However they can often be full of images that are difficult to interpret or irrelevant, and a large amount of text that is impossible to read or understand. They can also be heavy and this can make them unmanageable and uncomfortable to use.

In 2005 Pictures to Share Community Interest Company was set up with help from a number of charities and the Alzheimer’s Society, as a social enterprise to research and rectify this situation. It now provides a wide selection of books specifically designed for people with dementia.

Because the Pictures to Share books contain such a variety of powerful and accessible pictures that are not dependent on specific memories, people of all ages can enjoy them. This means that even the youngest visitor can spend enjoyable time with their elderly relative looking through a book. It also means that many images can have meaning both for a resident with dementia and carers from very different ethnic backgrounds. This can encourage a better quality of interaction in what can sometimes be a difficult relationship.

As books have played such a familiar and comforting role in the lives of many people, their potential value in the world of person centred dementia care is massive. When life is so restricted and confusing, anything that can help to provide a sense of normality is valuable and being able to ‘read’ a book can help to give people with dementia a sense of normality and a sense of self worth, as well as providing real enjoyment and encouraging better communication.

Pictures to Share C.I.C.
Tel:  01829 770024
www.picturestoshare.co.uk