Editorial
Promoting holistic care
could shape OMNI’s future
Thursday, April 28, 2005 - OMNIway Staff
When OMNI embraced supportive measures as its care approach, it made a commitment to reduce the amount of psychotropics residents receive by employing alternatives to medication. Supportive measures advocates set out to truly get to know residents better and learn about their past lives, hopes and dreams before the onset of dementia. upportive measures individualize care and examine the resident holistically.

For example, if a resident becomes agitated at a particular time each day, supportive measures advocates work to identify the triggers. Instead of medicating him, they get to know him by talking to his family members. They discover the man enjoyed classical music so they tune the radio in his room to a classical station. The agitation ceases.

OMNI has positioned supportive measures as its trademark. There’s no doubt the care approach is engrained in OMNI’s culture, to the point where staff members employ supportive measures by instinct.

By investing in supportive measures, OMNI is endorsing holistic care for its residents.

It is further embracing this type of alternative care through the flax flour program. The flax flour program or Natural Bowel Care Program adds ground flax seed into residents’ daily diets to reduce or eliminate the need for pharmaceutical laxatives. When piloted at Garden Terrace a year ago, in one month the home reduced the amount of pharmaceutical laxatives to eight from 564 the previous month. OMNI is planning to roll out the program in all 16 homes by year’s end.

OMNI provides other forms of holistic care through massage therapy, therapeutic bathing, multi-sensory rooms and spa days. These forms of therapies are being used to ease agitation in residents and improve range of motion. According to a massage therapist who sees Willows Estate residents, massage can have such an impact on residents who are agitated they will actually fall asleep during the process. Massage also helps with pain, improves circulation and stimulates blood flow, she says.

By promoting and continuing to support holistic care, OMNI is heading in the right direction. A recently-released Statistics Canada survey shows a trend towards greater use of alternative therapies, particularly in the middle-aged population. Canadians are turning to massage therapists, chiropractors and acupuncturists to cure what ails them. As the population ages, these same people may be looking to long-term care. If OMNI continues in the direction it’s headed, it could soon be the natural choice for those seeking holistic, person-centred care.