Category: person-centered care

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…

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A Lesson in Leadership in Person-Centered Elder Care

Author and Nursing Home Administrator, Nancy Fox, shares the moment she realized the reason many older adults fear nursing homes, and the two elders who showed her why. Nancy Fox is a Nursing Home Administrator, former executive director of The Eden Alternative, and Chief Innovation Officer for Vivage Senior Living. She is also the author of Lessons in Leadership for Person-Centered Elder Care. Here, she shares a leadership lesson she learned while vacationing on Sanibel Island, after years spent transforming her organization into a person-centered care environment. “She fell and can’t get up…” In…

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Moments Add Up and Make a Difference

We’d like for you to consider the following two scenarios. As you read them, we think you’ll begin to see how persons with dementia have many of the same needs that we do and how being a Best Friend can be a powerful tool for supporting quality of life. Scenario 1 Imagine meeting an old friend for lunch and finding your normally upbeat, positive friend in tears. As a friend, how would you respond? You would probably: Ask her what is wrong. Try to get more information. She tells you that she has been laid off from a job that…

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It’s Time to Revolutionize Elder Care

Dr. Al Power, award-winning author and internationally renowned geriatrician, opened the 2016 Eden Alternative International Conference with his keynote address focusing on the conference theme: It’s about time. Always an eloquent speaker, Al presented the audience with four points, all prefaced with, “It’s about time we…” Groundbreaking and possibly even controversial, the ideas presented here are entirely person-directed (the absolute core of culture change). Dr. Power presents his ideas with examples of model communities who adopted these practices—across the board, there was an increase in improved lives of elders in dementia care facilities. The…

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