Care Home Reminiscences

Reminiscence is a key component in health and well-being, especially for those living with Dementia. Here at Avery Healthcare, we embrace this ameliorating therapy across all our homes. Last week Grove Park Care Home spent some time collecting and acquiring items for their new reminiscence room. The room has become a haven filled with memory awakening items; such as past childhood games, themed books including life during the war, and photographs of the resident’s from an earlier time.

Reminiscing has taken place over the centuries through the storytelling of family histories and the passing down of heirlooms. Modern gerontologists have highlighted the benefits of people living with dementia recalling personal experiences from the past, as long-term memory is the strongest and the last to decline. This work involves talking about things from the past, using prompts such as photos, familiar objects or music.

Another of our homes, Amarna House Care Home, frequently do a lot of work involving nostalgia and reminiscence. Amarna has recently been asking for the residents’ relatives to send photos in of their families, capturing a moment in time, starting the theme off with lovely photos from the early sixties in York. They have based a fun quiz around this theme of ‘guess who’ is in the photographs, developing their community and engagement with residents and their families. The residents of these photos are reminded of extremely happy and vivid memories; one resident recalls of when he was a young boy playing on his bike up and down the alleyways. There is evidence that life story and reminiscence work, particularly on a one-to-one basis, can improve mood, wellbeing and some mental abilities such as memory. Our Avery Carers love to talk to the residents’ about who they are as a person and their favourite memories to create a better quality of life.