LEC develops one-to-one program to address residents’ interests, needs
One-to-one carts beneficial to residents with and without cognitive impairment
Monday April 28, 2008 -- Deron Hamel
One-to-one carts are successfully engaging residents at Forest Hill by appealing to their interests and needs, says life enrichment co-ordinator Craig Forrest.

The program, which began two months ago, sees life enrichment staff members at the Kanata long-term care home go room to room with a cart filled with various items appealing to residents’ interests and needs.

“The idea of the cart is to put things on it that pertain to the resident, that way you can really individualize the programming — especially for residents with cognitive impairments,” says Forrest, who developed the program.

For residents who have cognitive impairments, the cart contains articles which appeal to the senses, such as CDs with soft music or manicure kits. Residents without cognitive impairment who choose not to attend regular programming can participate in one-to-one reading activities, games and trivia with staff members.

Wanda Cole, a life enrichment aide at the home, says the program has been successful since its inception. She gauges this success by the fact that it engages residents involved in the program in conversation.

“I think it has been quite successful because it gets the residents to open up about their family and what they’ve done in their lives,” says Cole. “I find that it gets them talking. It gives them an opportunity to say exactly what they’ve done.”

For residents choosing not to attend programming, Forrest says his goal is to have them build a rapport with the life enrichment staff which, in turn, can result in them becoming involved with regular programming down the road.

Forrest adds that he came up with the idea for the program because he’s seeing an increasing number of residents with cognitive impairment coming into long-term care and wanted to bolster programming to meet their needs.

Life enrichment aides take note of which activities work and which ones don’t work for residents. By keeping track of successes new staff members working in the program can look at the residents’ charts and know which activities work best with individuals.

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