Best Friends – The HPP Resource Center

Category: Best Friends

Inside The Best Friends Staff, Second Edition

The second edition of the bestselling staff training tool from the Best Friends™ product suite is packed with resources to help staff in dementia care gain the required skills and confidence to deliver optimal care and succeed in this challenging caregiver role. Here, we break down the contents of the book so that you can see just how it can work for you! Part I discusses the foundations of effective training and provides an overview of the Best Friends approach. Reinvent and Energize Training Chapter 1 describes ways to reinvent and energize boring and ineffectual training programs. Currently, many providers…

How Can The Best Friends Staff Work for Me?

The Best Friends Staff: Learning to Deliver Exceptional Dementia Care focuses on the education and training for professionals learning to create an outstanding memory care program. The book is written for a wide audience of individuals working in long-term care settings, such as in-home services, adult day centers, assisted living, and skilled nursing care. The book will also be helpful for family care partners seeking to learn more about care services for their family members. If you work in memory care at any level, in any role, here is how this book can benefit you. Program administrators will learn how…

Intergenerational Activities: Using the Best Friends Approach with Children

With the Best Friends™ approach, activities are more than just what’s on the calendar. Using Best Friends, almost everything can become an extended, interesting opportunity for engagement. A simple handshake can lead to a discussion about fingernail polish, gloves, work done by hand, “lifelines,” rings on fingers, promise rings, weddings, and more. A teapot can be enjoyed for its beauty, and discussions can follow about making tea, reading tea leaves, the different flavors of tea, and the Boston Tea Party. Because the bottom line of the Best Friends approach is to focus on the person rather than the task. In…

In Memoriam: Virginia Bell (1922-2023)

Virginia Marsh Bell, M.S.W. (Lexington, KY / 1922–2023) It is with gratitude and pride that we recognize the long and productive life of a great friend and colleague, Virginia Bell, who recently left us—but not without leaving an enduring mark on the world, both through the innumerable lives she touched directly and in the reverberations from her good work that spread like ripples across the land and around the globe. With quiet strength and disarming wisdom, Virginia served as teacher, leader, and inspiration to friends, family, and professionals across her remarkable 100 years of life. In…

Starting with the Person: The Life Story and Human Rights

By Virginia Bell and David Troxel Rebecca Riley The Best Friends™ approach has been shaped by real people—people with dementia we have been privileged to meet and work with over the years. One of our earliest and most important “teachers” was a college friend of Virginia Bell. Rebecca Riley was a nurse educator who was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in her 50s. As she traveled what we now call the continuum of care—from home care, to day center care, to residential care—we were happy to share almost all of the dementia journey with her, including hundreds of hours spent together…

“You Have to Be a Rebel Sometimes”

On a hot summer morning in Baltimore in 2014, Virginia Bell, then 92, led a training on her groundbreaking approach to dementia care—one that stresses human dignity, gives the caregiver ideas for success, and inspires more hopeful, life-affirming attitudes. Standing in front of a packed class of attentive caregivers from all over the country, she shared her strategies for bringing about true, person-centered change in dementia care. She told them, “You have to be a rebel sometimes.” Believe it or not, the idea of person-centered care was a rebellious one when Virginia Bell co-founded the Best Friends Approach to dementia…

How Friendship Works in the Context of Dementia Care

If you are new to the field of dementia care, it might be confusing to think that an in-home client, day center participant, or resident can be a friend. Maybe you’ve been taught to address someone as Mrs. Smith instead of Anne. Maybe you are worried about boundaries. Why is it so important to think about the elements of friendship as you go to work every day with 40 people with dementia? The reason goes back to empathy. It’s easy for someone with dementia to get lost in confusion and feel disconnected from the flow of life. Without our intervention,…

Celebrating 100 Years with Virginia Bell

June 30, 2022 marks the 100th birthday of Virginia Bell, one of the most influential thought leaders in the field of dementia care over the last four decades, who continues to this day to improve the lives of people with dementia and their caregivers. HPP sat down with the legendary author, speaker, and advocate to look back on 100 years and look forward towards the future of dementia care. What influenced you to start your career later in life? What motivated you to choose to work in dementia care? I received my undergraduate degree in math and chemistry but as…

30 Dementia Care Activities During COVID-19

Dementia Care in the Time of COVID-19: 30 Activities That Can Be Done in 30 Seconds or Less Every interaction can create a moment of connection. This coronavirus-sensitive list offers just a few ideas for maintaining critical socialization and engagement in this time of crisis. Greet the person by his or her first name – Helps the person feel known; sometimes a first name is best Make eye contact and smile – From 6 feet away you can briefly lower your mask Tell someone he or she is loved – Reassuring words always help Give a sincere compliment…

Dementia Care at a Distance

The COVID-19 crisis is taking a heavy toll on all of us, particularly family and professional care partners. Visitors are prohibited in most residential care communities; this is necessary but certainly can be distressing to families and persons with dementia. Even when we are together, we are told to stay six feet apart. The very phrase “social distancing” is the opposite of the Best Friends™ Approach and what we want in quality dementia care. In many ways, socialization is the treatment for dementia. Social distancing (and lots of handwashing) is necessary to ensure good public health practices, but can we…

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