Dementia
What you need to know about dementia therapies now
Amrit Dhaliwal, chief executive of home care provider Walfinch, discusses what carers need to know in order to answer questions about dementia therapies and the promising drug treatments on the horizon
Many people affected by dementia – and their families – are asking questions about new drugs designed to treat the condition. What should carers say?
New drugs are great news, but
medication is only part of the answer. Therapies delivered by carers are still a huge part of dementia treatment. Carers can help spread knowledge about them, and the positive results that they can bring. There is a tendency among the general public to think that the only role for science in treating dementia is creating medications – but that is not true. Many dementia therapies delivered by carers are not just aimed at making people living with dementia happier, but are backed by scientific research, proving that they deliver beneficial results.
Singing and music Singing and music are recommended as a therapy for people with all kinds of dementia and many care homes arrange singing sessions. There are also community singing sessions aimed at people living with dementia, such as those arranged by Singing for the Brain.
Robin Boulter, care coordinator and deputy manager at Walfinch Southampton, has seen the results. “People with dementia can remember the words to songs they knew years ago, even at quite a late stage of the disease,” he says. “As a carer, I used to take one man with dementia out in my car and we’d put on music and both sing along. He liked oldies from singers like Sinatra and Sammy Davis Junior. He’d be changed man when we got back to his home.”
November 2024
www.thecarehomeenvironment.com
The science
Music stimulates many different areas of the brain, so even when some are damaged by dementia, other parts may still recognise and react to music. Skills such as singing, dancing, or playing the piano, learned in the distant past, are stored as procedural memories deep within the brain, and often retained long after other memories, stored in elsewhere in the brain, have faded. Why do people living with dementia often remember the words to old songs? Because regions of the brain that are involved in musical memory and processing (such as the cerebellum) are not as affected by Alzheimer’s or dementia until much later in the course of the disease. Music that has a strong personal meaning, such as the song played for the first dance at your wedding, or your favourite song to dance to as a teenager, is likely to be particularly memorable, because it stirs up strong emotions, and
New drugs are great news, but medication is only part of the answer
the capacity for emotion remains even in advanced dementia. Playlist for Life, an organisation that specialises in helping create personalised playlists for people with dementia points out: “Over two decades of scientific research has shown that listening to a personalised playlist can improve the lives of those living with dementia.” Music can reduce anxiety, improve mood, make difficult tasks more manageable, and evoke memories that can help families and carers connect.
Pet therapy Joan Shewry was diagnosed with dementia in 2019. Her son David says: “In her mind, we still have all of our family dogs, Dinkie, Monkey, and Toksy. “She would ask where they were, and I’d
say they were in the garden. It was a white lie, of course, because they passed away long ago, but she was happy with that.” When Joan’s carers from Walfinch Oxford discovered that she was a dog lover, they arranged a visit from Mya, a miniature poodle, and her owner. “Mum enjoyed the visit from Mya, who is 14 years old – so almost 100 in dog years. “Seeing Mya brought back lots of happy
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