Nursing Home Recreates Communist East Germany For Dementia Patients

[rpannier]

It's said that time heals all wounds. But not for people afflicted with dementia like Gerda Noack. The 93-year-old German woman's memory is fading, as is her eyesight.

The losses scare her. On a recent morning at the AlexA Residence for Senior Citizens in Dresden, where she lives, Noack sounded anxious as she asked, over and over: "Where am I supposed to go?"

Director Gunter Wolfram gently took her arm and suggested they visit a government-run store from the former communist East Germany called Intershop. The once popular chain no longer exists — but a mockup of the store is only a few steps away.

snip

The sight soothes Noack, and her face lights up each time she recognizes something. Like a shopping bag made out of a polyester fabric called Dederon — a name based on DDR, the German initials for the German Democratic Republic. Or a laundry detergent called Spee.

link
https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2018/01/22/578664161/nursing-home-recreates-communist-east-germany-for-dementia-patients

[rpannier]

1. also from the article

Wolfram says his is the only facility he knows of that conjures up the former East Gemany for its residents. But providing safe, inviting and historically familiar places for dementia patients is gaining traction worldwide. One "dementia village," Glenner Town Square, is due to open in San Diego this year and will feature a 1950s-'60s American "Main Street" experience for its residents.

Such settings expand on a widely accepted treatment known as memory therapy. Patients are shown or handed items from their past that help them retrieve older memories, which remain even after short-term memory fails.

Experts say memory therapy doesn't cure dementia, but it can improve brain function and increase the independence of patients in performing daily tasks like eating or going to the bathroom — which are results Wolfram has observed at his nursing home.

[applegrove]

2. So weird to think it was real only 30 years ago. Glad patients find security

in the past. At my dad's home they've given one woman a plastic baby to hold. So great how nursing homes are these days.

[MissB]

3. By the time Im ready for one itll be all 1980s

Duran duran on an endless loop.

[rpannier]

6. Grateful Dead, Black Sabbath, Jefferson Starship/Airplane and the Ramones on loop

would work for me

[CaliforniaPeggy]

4. What a great idea!

It gives these patients something precious that helps them feel less afraid.

I am glad to see this happening.

[Leghorn21]

5. Amazing, just amazing. Thanks much for posting, r. - sending around - nt

[mahina]

7. Life imitates art again. The film 'Goodbye Lenin' come to life!

[DFW]

9. You beat me to it!

My wife and I went to see that film when it came out. Really funny, but you had to understand contemporary Germany to get all the gags.

[mahina]

13. You, me, and KatyaR. Ill console myself with The Lives of Others

Which holds up a mirror to us now like never before.

Cheers DFW, you are one of my favorite DUers forever. I loved your insights and perspective.

[DFW]

16. Mahalo Mahina! You humble me.

I get enough flak from others on the board, so I appreciate your sentiments, and never forget that they are not universally shared.

As far as The Lives of Others goes, here's an interesting bit for you. My wife saw it before I did. She was off visiting Dresden, in the former East Germany, with a girlfriend while I was working some weekend, and it was right when that film came out. They decided to go see it. When they came back, they told me I HAD to see it. My wife said she'd gladly see it again, so we went downtown in Düsseldorf, where we live, to see it. When it ended, the whole theater was abuzz with conversation about the great film we had all just seen. My wife told me that in Dresden, when the film ended, the room was still with stunned silence. No one moved. The people there had just seen their former lives played back before them, and the film was so good, all the East Germans were speechless at having been transported for two hours back to the land of the Stasi and the "realexistierender Sozialismus ("true existing socialism," as the regime used to call it). For a short while, in that theater, all their fears and anxieties had been brought back for them to re-live.

[mahina]

19. Gives me pause to reflect on this. Thanks DFW for sharing that perspective.

I'll be thinking about this today.

Aloha no.

[KatyaR]

11. That's exactly what I thought of!

I need to watch that again, what a great movie.

[mahina]

14. Isnt it?

Someone should make a remake with a pre-Trump and the fall of our system.

That sounds more hopeless than I usually feel.

Cheers, nice to meet you.

[Hekate]

10. What a wonderful idea. I hope it really catches on. nt

[Takket]

12. Seems strange but actually very sweet! Smart idea

[oberliner]

15. What a drag it is getting old

[Aristus]

17. I'll always be grateful for the Wall coming down and the reunification

of Germany.

If only for the masses of drop-dead gorgeous young ladies cruising west from the erstwhile East in their Trabants.

[crazycatlady]

18. What a great idea

When my grandmother had dementia, we got her an iPod shuffle and loaded it with Big Band era music. She was sitting there with her headphones and you could see her nodding away to the music of her youth.