{"id":13689,"date":"2023-05-11T17:34:19","date_gmt":"2023-05-11T14:34:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/?p=13689"},"modified":"2023-05-11T17:34:25","modified_gmt":"2023-05-11T14:34:25","slug":"why-dementia-villages-are-the-future-of-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/?p=13689","title":{"rendered":"“Why “Dementia Villages” are the future of care”?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

“Dementia Villages” are structures that combine modern medicine with the traditional idea of a small community and that have begun to appear in various parts of the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dementia is one of the most difficult diseases. Because other diseases can kill the sufferer, in its duration, and because it erases parts of the sufferer’s life, as if he never lived them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Essentially, memory means life. The first years of our life, of which we have no memories at all, do we feel that we lived them? We would say no. Our parents lived through those years, but not the sufferers as children \u2013 because we all humans don’t remember our childhood years at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They motivate you to build as many memories as you can. And that’s because more memories mean you’ve lived longer. So when images steeped in nostalgia are deleted, it is like deleting a part of a person’s life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in dementia, the sufferer loses the ability to form memories. It even forgets the ones you’ve already created. Let’s think how painful it is to delete favorite photos from our mobile device. Now let’s imagine how hopeless it would be if our brain did the same without asking our permission. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dementia often begins with memory loss but gradually progresses to the point where someone is unable to care for themselves. He can’t use the bathroom. He can’t change clothes. Therefore, he ends up needing round-the-clock care.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently in developed Western societies, the state of the care system is not ideal. Patients either have 24-hour care at home or are admitted to a special facility. In the structures, some lose their identity completely. They must share the same roof with other patients. To listen to the same music as everyone else. To eat the same food as everyone else. They don’t have the freedom to go out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In effect, they are no longer themselves: they are a patient receiving care while the world awaits their death. An inspiring solution \u2013 which makes a huge leap from the current situation \u2013 is the idea of a \u201cDementia Village\u201d like Hogeweyk in the Netherlands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s like any neighborhood: with theaters, cafes, barbershops, etc. But it has something special: all its residents are dementia patients and all the workers (waiters, barbers, etc.) are trained in it.<\/p>\n\n\n

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These villages operate according to a number of principles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Normality:<\/em> Instead of cramming all the people under one roof as happens in dementia facilities, it divides them into groups of 6-7 people and gives them normal homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Autonomy:<\/em> Patients have complete independence. They can stay in their room or visit the garden next door. Even taking a walk around the neighborhood, going to the cafe and ordering to eat whatever they want. The choice is theirs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scientific care:<\/em> Throughout the neighborhood there are colorful doors, support bars and walking guides to facilitate the movement of its residents. Even the plates are brightly colored, which has been observed to motivate Alzheimer’s sufferers to eat more food. Special coatings on surfaces and furniture absorb sounds that could cause disorientation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Promoting social contact:<\/em> Cafes, theaters and barbershops have been purposefully placed in different buildings to encourage socialization of neighborhood residents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Essentially, these villages replace, for patients, institutionalization with normality combined with care. They seek to make them feel not like patients, but like normal people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, not every country in the world can afford their costs, which are estimated annually at 70,000 to 90,000 dollars per patient. But it’s a start. And they are great.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While life expectancy is increasing worldwide, so is the proportion of elderly people, so the incidence of dementia is expected to increase as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To care for this population, we need more inspiring solutions like Dementia Villages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We all feel pessimistic and lose hope when we hear bad news from around the world. And when someone tells us that the world is going from bad to worse, we tend to agree immediately.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But change is happening gradually. We won’t fix the problems overnight, but we are definitely moving towards a better future. Dementia Villages are proof.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Dementia Villages” are structures that combine modern medicine with the traditional idea of a small community and that have begun to appear in various…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13690,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,2959,2993],"tags":[3015,4316,2214],"class_list":["post-13689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","category-healthcare","category-life","tag-dementia","tag-dementia-villages","tag-healthcare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13689"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13689\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13692,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13689\/revisions\/13692"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}