Category: Education

Communicating with a person living with Dementia while wearing Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)

Posted on by Reagan Morgan

Do you ever wonder what a person with Dementia would think about regarding the COVID-19 pandemic? What exactly are they thinking about when they see their family and friends wearing a mask? What about when they think about the fact that they cannot go outside to public spaces or outings? Why is my family not visiting me? These are all questions that a person living with Dementia could be thinking about during the COVID-19 pandemic. Because of this, a person living with Dementia may experience an increase in anxiety and/or confusion about the world around them. A person living with Dementia who is living in a Retirement or Long-Term Care home and is in isolation from their family and friends cannot properly understand all the precautionary measures taken during this time. The lack of visiting, going outdoors, and people wearing masks can impact their mental health and ability to socialize. This is why it is important to fully understand how to communicate and approach a person living with Dementia when you put on your Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).

In a health care setting, a person’s living with Dementia are likely unaware of current events and may have difficulty understanding the need for additional PPE & precautions in place. These extra precautions may be stressful for them because it is out of their normal daily routine. Once a person living with Dementia’s routine changes from their ordinary lifestyle, it can cause confusion and frustration for them. Normally, a person’s living with Dementia often rely on body language and facial expressions during interactions with another person, however, if they cannot see your mouth or your body language, this can affect them as well. This is why it is important to communicate properly with a person with Dementia even if you are wearing a lot of Personal Protection Equipment.

It is important to allow time for the person living with Dementia to process and understand who is approaching them. It may take additional time for them to understand what is being asked, and since a mask can cover up your mouth and distort their ability to understand or recognize your face, this could cause extra stress as well. It is always important to have direct eye contact with the person living with Dementia while communicating with them. When approaching them, remember to always use their name often when providing instructions to maintain their attention. If a person’s living with Dementia have questions surrounding precautions or PPE, provide simplified explanations so they can understand easily. Always remember to be mindful of your own non-verbal cues that the person’s living with Dementia may be responding to (body language, tone of voice, and facial expressions). It is important that you remain calm at all times. These are some important tips from the Alzheimer’s Society that you can take while communicating with a person in your life who is living with Dementia.

Marco Sanfilippo
Marketing Specialist/Recreation Assistant

Celebrating Seniors in Ontario — Stay Safe, Stay in Touch

Posted on by Reagan Morgan
June is Seniors’ Month! Make sure you Stay Safe, Stay in Touch

In Ontario, the month of June is considered Seniors’ Month and is a time to reflect and celebrate all seniors from across the province. This year’s theme is “Stay Safe, Stay in Touch” and it focuses on keeping our seniors safe, connected, and engaged at their home during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the Minister for Seniors and Accessibility Raymond Cho “As we take this opportunity to mark Seniors’ Month, we recognize that these are very challenging times for seniors as they continue to self-isolate due to the risk of COVID-19. Now more than ever, it is important that we come together to support our seniors and recognize and honour the knowledge, experience, and the contributions that seniors have made to build the province that we enjoy today.”

Let us make this month extra special for our seniors by showing them as much support and love as possible. If you have a senior in your life, or if you want to help out voluntarily, please take the time to reach out to them to ensure that they have what they need during this very difficult time. There are plenty of things you can do to stay in touch with seniors, you can give them a call over the phone or through FaceTime or Zoom, you could pick up some groceries for them so they can stock up their refrigerators’ so they have food, or you could safely see them through a window while visiting. Anything that you do to help or connect with a senior will increase their level of happiness, especially since most of them cannot leave their home due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Ontario Government has the highest regard for our seniors and they are committed to protecting and supporting them as much as possible. According to Raymond Cho “We are continuing to invest in almost 300 Seniors Active Living Centres which help seniors remain active and engaged in age-friendly communities.” Cho said that 175 of these programs are currently being offered remotely through teleconference, online videos, and one on one phone calls. These are all critical programs that help seniors stay connection while being at home. The Ontario Government also invested $11 million dollars to implement the Ontario Community Support Program, which is used to help coordinate meals, medicine, and other necessities to seniors across the province. Not only that, but the Ontario government is also developing a comprehensive Seniors’ Strategy which helps seniors remain healthy, active, and socially engaged during the COVID-19 pandemic.

As you can see, the Ontario Government is doing a lot to support seniors during this most difficult time, and since June is Seniors’ Month, we should all be doing our part by reaching out to our seniors as well. At Bay Haven Care Community, the Recreation team conducts and designs programs that help stimulate seniors emotional, intellectual, physical, vocational, social, spiritual, and environmental well-beings to benefit the seniors lifestyle. This month, let’s stay safe and stay in touch together as we help our seniors cope through this pandemic lockdown.

Marco Sanfilippo
Marketing Specialist/Recreation Assistant

The Importance of Digitizing Your Business

Posted on by Reagan Morgan
Modernizing Bay Haven’s Digital Presences

We are officially in the year 2020, which is a crucial year for many businesses to finally focus on digitizing their business to become up-to-date with the modern world. All types of businesses are digitizing faster than we can comprehend, and it is important for you to not fall behind. Any small town or local business needs to begin planning an online presences of their company, whether focusing on a new modernized website, or adjusting their social media pages to stand out from their competitors, these are the tools that will make your business grow and become better than ever.

1) Phones > Newspapers: To begin, we have to understand the evolution process of human beings and how we receive our information. Simply put, humans do not read newspapers anymore. At one point in history, the newspaper was the only source of news that a person could get. But now, everyone uses their phone or computer to look up whatever they want. If you truly understood how many people use the internet to look things up, wouldn’t you want your website to look better than your competitors? As Bay Haven’s Marketing Specialist, I am planning on updating the website to modernize it for 2020. This is a project that I am excited to work on for the new year.

2) Pictures Speak A Thousand Words: It is simply true; pictures speak a thousand words. We are living in a fast-pace culture where images and pictures stand out a lot more than words. In our new fast-pace culture, people do not have time to read anymore. This is why it is important to post beautiful pictures on your website or social media pages. For Bay Haven, pictures are a very important way for us to communicate with resident’s family members that live far away. This is the most ideal way for family members to see their parents or grandparents living life at Bay Haven. This is why we try to post as many pictures and videos as we can on our Facebook page.

3) Social Media Interaction: For 2020, I plan on creating new social media pages for Bay Haven Care Community. I would like to create a Bay Haven Twitter, Instagram, and a TikTok account. I believe it is important for Bay Haven to communicate with all major social media platforms, because it is a way to express Bay Haven’s culture to families. Even though Facebook is the most used social media page for Bay Haven, I would like to expand Bay Haven’s horizons by interacting with members through other popular social media pages. This is important to do for any kind of business.

4) Website Representation: To make your business stand out from your competitors, it is important to show a good representation of your company through your website. Having a clean, fresh, and new look of your company through your website can really create an amazing image for your company. Here at Bay Haven, we want people to know that we are strive for the best possible care for our residents, and that our core values of respect, quality, staff, and community is positively represented over our website. The first thing that people do when they look up a retirement or nursing home for their loved ones, they search the company through Google. Having a great representation through our website is an amazing way to promote the excellence that comes from Bay Haven.

As a Marketing Specialist, I can confidentially say that these are four important first steps to bring your company into the online world. I am excited to work on Bay Haven’s marketing plan for 2020, so please continue to follow us as you venture on a journey with us to see new modern changes coming to Bay Haven’s online presences.

Marco Sanfilippo
Marketing Specialist/Recreation Assistant

Who Is Teepa Snow? Bay Haven Staff Went To Her Conference

Posted on by Reagan Morgan
Teepa Snow Workshop

Before you begin to read this article, you may be asking yourself, who is Teepa Snow? Teepa Snow is a leading trainer and consultant providing support and care that places the person living with dementia in a pivotal role when determining what is needed. Her goal is to help communities, agencies, organizations, professionals, and families to develop the awareness, knowledge, and skills needed to better support and care for someone living with dementia. Teepa Snow is the owner and CEO of Positive Approach to Care. Her organization provides training, services and products to help those who have dementia. Teepa Snow has successfully integrated her education, extremely varied work experiences, recent medical and international research, and her first-hand care experiences to be a major part of her companies’ program. All these tools are used to help people living with neurocognitive degeneration.

It is Teepa Snow’s mission to change the culture of dementia support and care throughout the world. Positive Approach to Care focuses on the best ways to approach and develop a relationship with a patient who has dementia. Relationships that are based on authenticity, empowerment, compassion, and curiosity. Teepa Snow believes that this mind-frame is important to everyone, because understanding a person who has dementia is the best way to get to truly know the person suffering with this disease. Teepa Snow had a conference held at Hawk Ridge Golf & Country Club near Orillia, Ontairo, and luckily, some staff at Bay Haven Care Community got to go and watch her lecture live. I happened to be one of those lucky employees, and believe me, it was such a fantastic experience. Teepa Snow went over so many different situations about people who have dementia. Her energetic personality and approach to people living with dementia was incredible to learn and see. Teepa Snow’s care strategies and techniques look at what is known about the brain function and all of the changes that happen with various conditions and then integrate all of that information with therapeutic approaches. She went over a bunch of topics related to the neurological functions of the brain and she told us how to put our caring and support to those with dementia into practice in a positive, loving, and rewarding way.

The conference went from 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM and breakfast and lunch were both provided! Not only that, every table represented the retirement/nursing home you worked at, so it was nice to have a Bay Haven Care Community table. Teepa Snow got everyone in attendance involved by making everyone participate in her techniques and approach to proper caring. It was very fun to be able to practice these techniques with your co-workers and be able to learn new things that we could all bring to our work. Teepa Snow is a phenomenal lecturer and I highly recommend everyone to go to one of her conferences whenever she is in Canada. Bellow are a couple links to her videos from YouTube.

Teepa Snow Discusses The Ten Early Signs of Dementia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqmqC-702Yg

Calming & Comforting a Person Living with Dementia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGqYaRhjxrM

Marco Sanfilippo – Marketing Specialist/Recreation Assistant