I ama firm believer in the power of creativity and after completing the bold Scotland programme I had felt a sense of community, inspired and confident. I went on to explore the effectiveness of arts-based methods to develop social leaders in dementia. You may already be familiar with arts-based methods but if not, these are ..read more

SPOTLIGHT ON SPORT https://dementiatogether.online/home/sport Have you seen our online interactive website, Connecting People Connecting Support online Occupation Matters? The aim of the website is to reach out to individuals, their families and those working alongside them to find ways to connect or reconnect with valued roles and occupations to support people’s health and wellbeing. We have created a clear accessible structure which mirrored the elements of the Occupational Therapy peer support group, Journeying through Dementia (Craig et al 2023) that includes Chat (ideas to promote convers ..read more

Image by Amy “When you’ve met one person with dementia, you’ve met one person with dementia”, said the well-respected Professor Tom Kitwood. This resonates with my experience, as I come to the end of my third and final university art psychotherapy placement working with patients with dementia. My experience has been a challenging but inspiring one. Both uplifting and affirming, I have witnessed how invaluable creative expression can be for people with dementia.   I feel it has been important to offer a large variation of materials, as Kitwood notes, every person with dementia is unique as ..read more

image from Finding our Voice. Paul Tucker and Bettina Talbot As an academic in the field of drama, theatre and performance I’m a strong advocate for the efficacy of both watching and participating in performance and, in my experience, I’ve seen powerful examples of individuals benefitting from it from in a number of ways. There’s solid evidence for drama being a powerful tool in the school curriculum, of its potential for improving skills and confidence in communication, collaboration, and learning through drama (see Heathcote 1991). In other words, drama and performance teaches us about the w ..read more

Developing an entirely different way of offering occupational therapy to people with cognitive changes for the better I came into post as Head Occupational Therapist for Older Adult Mental Health Services in Aneurin Bevan University Health Board just as COVID hit in March 2020. Despite the obvious distractions, I was very keen to capture a baseline of what the occupational therapy service was delivering and to identify the areas that were working well and where we had room for improvement in line with key drivers such as the Dementia Action plan for Wales (2018-2022). Through the audit we fou ..read more

Hello, my name is Samantha, and I was a 4th year student studying Occupational therapy at Queen Margaret University. During my final practice placement with Alzheimer Scotland, I had amazing opportunities to meet individuals who all have a unique story to tell. On Monday 8th April, myself and my colleague Chloe met with Gordon who attends the groups at Alzheimer Scotland and is known well by the staff in the West Lothian Brain Health and Dementia resource centre. Gordon took us out to take photos of nature and the surrounding buildings, encouraging Chloe and I to take unique photos and edit t ..read more

Your voice, your choice, your future #WeCare #DAW24 https://www.alzscot.org/DAW24 Each year, Dementia Awareness Week (DAW) is held with the aim of raising awareness of dementia and helping improve the lives of people with dementia, their families and carers.  Each person living with dementia has their own unique story, and their needs, preferences and aspirations are as diverse as they are. During the week you will see Alzheimer Scotland advocate for a care approach that enables people with dementia to live as well as they can for as long as they can. Good care respects and embraces diver ..read more

This blog emerged as a result of my project work with Alzheimer Scotland. During this project I had the privilege of updating content on the www.connectingpeopleconnectingsupport.online website. This fantastic website was designed to help you embed health promoting activities into your daily routine. The blog itself was born out of requests for advice and strategies related to cutlery usage. However, as we delved deeper, we recognised that there were additional mealtime-related challenges that could benefit from practical solutions. As an Occupational Therapist, my constant focus is on preser ..read more

http://www.alzscot.org/ahpwebinars What a lovely way to finish my day.  Very interesting and motivating presentation.  Loved it.  thank you. Every two months we work together as an allied health professional’s community to develop, for you, a national AHP Dementia Webinar where we share the work and practice of allied health professionals in Scotland. Our vision for the webinars is “through working in partnership, we can all improve outcomes for people that really matter”. Our AHP Dementia webinar at the end of 2023 was called “Music Therapy, Care Home Teams and Dementia”.   ..read more

Thanks so much to all. Really valuable session. Really great webinar everyone was super. Every two months we work together as an allied health professionals community to develop, for you, a national AHP Dementia Webinar where we share the work and practice of allied health professionals in Scotland. Our vision for the webinars is “through working in partnership, we can all improve outcomes for people that really matter”. Our AHP Dementia webinar in October 2023 with just over 200 people was called “Sharing the importance of driving from the perspectives of lived experience, clinical practice ..read more