Dynamic Care Model
Aktios is possibly the most specialized centre of long-term care for demented patients in Greece. The dynamic model that we apply ensures not just the quality of care but also the quality of life of our residents.
We take for granted and as self-evident the right of our residents for qualitative nursing care, reliable and frequent medical supervision, good nutrition, and professional behavior, personal hygiene, clean environment, politeness and safety. But we do not consider these to be sufficient enough. We take equally for granted the need for socialization, communication, cognitive training, orientation in space and time, facilitation of their adjustment, retraining, expression, control of the environment, provide relief and discharge, fitness and exercise as well as the need to have continuous feedback and new stimuli.
We reinforce and motivate our residents in a dynamic way.
We do this by taking advantage of space and time, using colors and music, specialized staff and numerous pleasant activities as well as other various interventions such as the following:
- Adjustment of our program and our activities according to the abilities, the interests and the desires of our residents
- Time and space orientation
- Cognitive training exercises
- Relearning activities
- Physical exercise
- Decision and participation in activities and procedures of daily living News and information about the daily social and political life and issues about the internal operation of the unit
- Development and exploration of issues of common interest
- Participation in external activities (visits in museums, churches, gyms etc)
- Music, singing, dancing
- Creative activities (gardening, painting, collage)
- Games
We transform our facilities into a “playground” where the weaknesses of the patients caused by their illness don’t render someone less worthy of the right in active ageing and quality of life.
A place where forgetting or not being able to remember, not being able to manage things on your own, or being in need for nursing care is not perceived as something “bad”.
Everyday there are 5-6 occupational groups that take place in the common spaces of the unit, groups that actually constitute what is called “non pharmacological interventions for people suffering from dementia and generally for the elderly”. Besides research has clearly proved that demented patients benefit the most by combining the right use of the proper medication with motivational and awareness exercises.
The non pharmacological interventions cover a broad range of activities, such as cognitive training, newspaper reading and conversation, retraining in activities of personal care and hygiene, reminiscence therapy, art therapy, singing groups and several games in our spaces.
These activities share basic common goals such as socialisation, cognitive training, orientation is space and time, facilitating the resident’s adjustment in a new environment, provide relief and discharge, presentation of new stimuli and exercise.
Even the celebrations, and events that we frequently organise, are actually a way to remind our residents the present time and season and an opportunity for the unit’s staff, our residents and their relatives to strengthen their relationships, have a good time and feel relief. Thus resident of the unit finally gets used to stay in his room only during the time that he goes to sleep, while the rest of the time he finds himself actively participating in a living environment, in which he feels important and special. This process is facilitated even more by the mutual relationship and contact with the community, by our participation in the community’s events and the participation of the community in our celebrations respectively.
The dynamic model applied in Aktios is contrary with the anachronistic view of a static foundation and is based in a flexible organisational structure that is characterised by adjustability and continuous feedback from the society and the environment.
This actually means that the human resources, the provided services and the surrounding spaces are not limited to a static and mechanical view of reality, but are characterized by flexibility that permits to reorganise things in order to meet the residents’ special needs and abilities. In this way the therapeutic program is adjusted to the residents’ needs, the surroundings change form according to the social occasions and the seasons while the nutrition has more than enough variety in order to satisfy the special dietary needs and habits of our residents.
In order to ensure the quality of care of our residents, it is equally important to have a stable program of daily activities, starting from the satisfaction of the basic biological needs such as awakening, food, defecation, urination and sleep.
This framework includes the activities that feel pleasant to our residents such as painting and the occupational groups, neutral activities such as taking the meditation, and activities like the personal hygiene and bath that are perceived as unpleasant.
It is necessary to follow a stable activities program, and to faithfully apply the time schedule in order to minimize the stressful stimuli and to prevent unnecessary nervousness and irritability and unexpected situations such as enuresis.
However the strict compliance with the program is not a goal on itself but having the necessary flexibility we are able to adjust the resident’s program in his daily living in order to retain and reinforce his autonomy.
In Aktios we combine the dynamic model with a stable program of activities in order to provide a secure place for the elderly with dementia where the highest level of care is achieved and the respect in the resident’s dignity is ensured.
