It’s always a pleasure to receive confirmation that our Remember-I’m-Me Care Charts truly make a difference, and particularly so when it helps a care home implement changes requested by their CQC inspector.

A manager in Kent recently purchased the charts (Standard: RIMWC01) in response to a CQC request that they improve the choices available to residents: preferred bedtime, what did they like to be called, favourite foods… exactly what our charts are designed to record. The carers like them because the knowledge they gain about a resident empowers them to provide more personalised care, the families like them because the chart allows them to stay involved and offer help. It all results in a better quality of life for the resident… and if they have a good quality of life, then so does everyone else around them.

Whilst I was at my mother’s hospital bedside a few weeks ago, being given rather more detail than I wanted about the operation to fit her new hip, I was given a wonderful demonstration of why our latest product can play such a valuable role, and not just to help with dementia sufferers either.

My Mum is a feisty lady and sharp as a pin, but she was tired and woozy and for the first few hours it was a struggle for her even to string a sentence together. Because of possible complications she was kept in intensive care for a couple of days and the staff were wonderful, friendly and extremely attentive. But other than a list of medical needs there was nothing for them to refer to about those other issues that might help them interact with their patient and understand her needs.

Her name for starters. Officially Elizabeth but she’s always hated that so has been called Liz for well over 70 years, yet there was nowhere to make that clear. I could sense her exasperation when, in quick succession, she was called Elizabeth, Lizzie and Jean (no idea where that came from). When I was there I could correct them, but if she’d had a Pocket Chart stood up on her bedside table it would have been there for all to see. They’d also have known that she was anxious to get her teeth back in place, they could have provided her with her preferred hot drink and my contact details would have been available, all without them having to ask.

Just one more thing. I had a chat with one of the intensive care nurses about what sort of information they might like to see. I assumed they wouldn’t want to be bothered with details like past pets and favourite hobbies. On the contrary. They want to know about the person they are looking after, in exactly the same manner as carers do. It helps them to remember the people they are caring for are human beings with needs and preferences like the rest of us, not just a list of symptoms.

Click here to order a pack of Pocket Care Charts now.

The habits of the chimpanzee may not be the usual topic for a talk on activities for older people, but you can always rely on Sylvie Silver to check we’re awake and concentrating. The Director of NAPA, the National Association for Providers of Activities for Older People, gave a fascinating talk at the Showcase for Social Care event in Brighton on 13th March, which clearly forced a large part of the audience to re-think some of their ideas.

Sylvie’s comment about the chimpanzees was in relation to research undertaken on various species of animal as to the size of group in which they function best. And yes, that includes humans, and the answer for us is… 4. So why, Sylvie asked, do we insist that care home residents will be happiest when herded into the lounge and forced to take part in some group activity in which they have never shown a previous interest? Of course she was not saying it would never be an appropriate thing to do, but it certainly made me re-adjust my sense that residents being left in their own room is a failure on the part of the care home. Not at all. Would we not all choose to remain within our own space, our own possessions around us, for most of the time?

Which leads on to another of Sylvie’s points, the importance of treating a resident’s room as their home (which happens to be one of the topics in our set of daily prompt posters). She mentioned a home which had fitted door knockers on each resident’s bedroom door, to reinforce the idea that one was going in to a person’s home. I love that idea, though I can see it wouldn’t work in every environment or for every individual.

And of course it’s the fact that every person has different needs that was at the heart of Sylvie’s talk. Where one person can get delight just watching clowds drift by, she reminded us, another would find sky gazing tedious and nonsensical. The activities board on the wall has its place, but a person’s ‘activities’ is everything they do from morning ’til night.

Thanks, Sylvie, for an excellent talk.