ELDERLY INFANTS

After journalist Stella Braam was confronted with the fact that her father was growing demented and that he was not treated in the right way, she wrote a book called ‘I am growing demented’. The book is about the patronizing care and the wrong treatment patients get. Braam: ‘People that are growing demented are treated like elderly infants. People do not talk with them, they talk about them.’

Three months after the presentation of the book the message has become a mission. Stella Braam gives lectures and is active setting up work shops. A short film about her father is made to be shown in nursing homes. A health insurer decided to spread posters and postcards with tips for the communication with people growing demented in around 300 nursing homes. The tips are formulated by Stella’s father. Braam: ‘The tips are the result of a search for how we can stay on touch with each other.’

The father of Stella Braam is psychologist and every morning he wakes up in a new and strange room. Every day he is busy meeting the people in the nursing home over and over again. Stella Braams explains what it means to grow demented. ‘Just imagine the you just got a new job in an unknown building. you do not know what you have to do and a PC is not to be found. For the rest you are sabotaged by your colleagues and you are not allowed to leave. An overwhelming and total chaos is the result.’ Her father explains it as follows: ‘It seems that you exist less and less.’

The main tips for the communication with people growing demented: ‘Be close to the person, mention hers/his name as much as possible, explain where the person is, explain who you are and use simple sentences. Braam explains that she made loads of mistakes in the beginning. ‘I was correcting him al the time. He became thoroughly miserable because of this. He realised that he was degenerating more and more. She unlearned this now. Her father explains: ‘First I have to manage to remember today.’

In the Dutch nursing homes there is usually not enough personnel and they are mostly low-qualified. They are busy with the protocols and for communication there is not enough time. To Stella Braam communication is the key to prevent problems in behaviour. A professor nursing home nursing is very touched by the book of father and daughter. ‘I am sure that people growing demented keep having a sort of consciousness, that’s why the presence of family and friends is so important. But most of the time family does not want to come anymore, because mother or father does not say anything anyway. I always try to change their mind by explaining that they have to see the patient as a human being with a soul and a personality. They are not empty shells.’

The professor is shocked by the Stella Braams book. The problem of people growing demented is very complex and traumatic for the patient, the family and the personnel. The young under qualified personnel is confronted with complex problems which are often intensified by the sense of guilt and dealing with grief of the family. He also underlines the problem of understaffing cause a shortage of specialist while the number of people growing demented is increasing seriously. Braam confirms: ‘When you are with two and you have to get 18 people growing demented out of bed, than you can have nice idea’s about treatment, but than you will not have the time for any real communication.’

In the nursing home where Braams father is living the advice of the daughter an father is adopted. Recommendations are mentioned on posters, personnel attends courses twice a year and everybody has a little booklet with ‘do’s and donts’. ‘Do not confront or correct! Do not test patients and do not tell them their mother they are looking for is already dead for years’.

The atmosphere in the nursing home changed totally. Now it is a lot more quiet. ‘When the inhabitants get impatient, it is up to the personnel to find out what is wrong’, an employee states.

Stella Braam tried to explain a few times what was happening with their book. ‘I can make him happy with book over and over again. Every time is the first time. It is important to laugh. With her father about her father. The nursing home sold the set of recommendations to so many other institutions that the costs for the material are recovered. Now also an American hospital organisation is interested in the Dutch approach. more features

March 3, 2006