Aged care residents relive the golden oldies with a little help from tech savvy teens
WACHS Midwest aged care residents Jorna and Paddy enjoying their personalised music playlists through the donated headphones
An innovative, personalised music therapy program for people living with dementia in the Midwest is helping aged care residents revisit powerful memories, with the help of local high school students.
Residents from WA Country Health Service (WACHS) Residential Aged Care sites across the Midwest are benefitting from the donation of almost 100 pairs of headphones from the Geraldton-Greenough Rotary Club.
Rotary enlisted the help of students at Nagle Catholic College to create each resident’s personalised playlist on an SD card which is then loaded directly into the headphones.
WACHS Midwest Acting Manager Aged and Community Care Narelle Dennett said the program complemented the range of aged care services available in the Midwest region.
“Across the Midwest, WACHS has skilled aged care assessment teams, older patient initiatives and valuable subacute programs such as changes in memory and thinking education and telegeriatrician services, so we were thrilled with yet another way to support our aged care residents,” Ms Dennett said.
“Music acts as a therapeutic medium that can trigger memories with strong emotions attached, something that remains intact for those with Alzheimer’s, even into the later stages of the disease.”
“Our personal memories of music are closely tied to our self-identity and life story.”
The positive effects of using music to aid reminiscence in people with dementia has been the subject of several studies worldwide, identifying benefits including increased conversation and recollection of personal events that involved music.
“For our residents, music can shift mood, manage stress-induced agitation, stimulate positive interactions, facilitate cognitive function, and coordinate motor movements.”
WACHS is taking action to support older Western Australians by improving access to residential and community-based aged care services in regional communities.
Carnarvon’s new $19.9 million Gnullingoo Mia Residential Care demonstrates WACHS’s drive to provide local residents with modern facilities where they can age on country and close to home.
Ms Dennett said that collaborating with community organisations to deliver programs for aged care residents is part of an initiative to expand holistic care.
“This is a fantastic project, and we’re extremely grateful to Rotary and to the students at Nagle for showing they care about the wellbeing of our aged care residents as much as we do,” she said.