Specialized center helps seniors with memory loss

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By John Keahey

The Salt Lake Tribune

Provo • Helen Hassell, all smiles and with a little help from her friend, pushed her way through the front door of the Aspen Senior Center housed in a former church meetinghouse.

The 89-year-old Orem woman was looking forward to her time in the unique center designed to help people with early symptoms of Alzheimer’s or dementia. She sat down at a round table in the midst of four other senior women and three staff members and jumped right in to play a round of memory games.

The large room, once the church’s sanctuary, is full of comfortable couches and chairs, along with tables overflowing with a variety of crafts that would appeal to both men and women. A quilting frame sits in the middle, next to a pool table. A donated organ is on the low stage, along with a piano. In another room, a library is being put together. A television room packed with comfortable chairs is nearby.

On the other side of the building is a snoezelen therapy room, so-named after a European concept. Designed as a multi-sensory quiet space, it is used to help settle clients who may be undergoing a severe dementia attack. Calming music can be played and different relaxing scents are available. A soft daybed rests along a wall.

Back in the main room, and within a half hour of Helen’s arrival, the women and their coaches were seated in an open circle, moving arms and legs in a relaxed series of exercises.

“Helen has a short-term memory problem,” said caregiver Nancy Pomeroy. After the exercise session and lunch, she listened to the other women talking about their lives, and it triggered memories of her own that she shared with the group.

“That’s exactly what she needs.”

Helen lives alone. Her three sons, all living out of state, rotate monthly visits of a week at a time to help their mom with house cleaning and bill paying, said Pomeroy. But Helen gets lonely at other times, and her age and medical conditions keep her from going to traditional senior centers run by counties and other nonprofit groups. That and her mild dementia.
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Specialized center helps seniors with memory loss(part 3)

Activities directors and other healthcare professionals here is a great dementia resource for caregivers and healthcare professinals,

Here is information on being the best caregiver you can be

Here is a way for nurses administrators, social workers and other health care professionals to get an easyceu or two

Here are more interesting dementia brain boosting activities





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Staples acknowledged there are more women out there than men — women tend to outlive their partners — and that many senior men aren’t as social as women; they prefer to stay in their homes where everything is familiar, Staples said.

Alzheimer’s program director Zullo said his organization was in the process of referring to Aspen several men showing early stage memory loss who attend monthly counseling sessions at the Utah Chapter.

Cost for a full day is $58, including lunch catered by three different restaurants in the area. Or clients can pay $10 an hour, plus $9 for lunch.

“The idea is to serve the entire family by allowing family caregivers time off from the responsibilities of caring for their senior. Or, they can participate here with them,” said Staples.

Specialized center helps seniors with memory loss (part 2)

Activities directors and other healthcare professionals here is a great dementia resource for caregivers and healthcare professinals,

Here is information on being the best caregiver you can be

Here is a way for nurses administrators, social workers and other health care professionals to get an easyceu or two

Here are more interesting dementia brain boosting activities





Get your subscription to Activity Director Today's e magazine

What Aspen hopes to provide through its approach to daytime senior care, called “unique and innovative” by officials at the Utah Chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association, is a solution for all her needs.

“We call Aspen a ‘transitional activity center’ where folks with early symptoms [of memory problems] can get help with cognitive activity, nutrition, exercise and social engagement,” said Nick Zullo, the Utah Chapter’s program director.

He and colleague Sylvia Brunisholz, a family services counselor, agree that Aspen’s transitional approach is in great need along the Wasatch Front.



“To our knowledge, there are only three such [daytime, transitional] centers in the Salt Lake Valley, two in the Utah County area and one in Davis County,” Brunisholz said. They act as a bridge between traditional centers where seniors go on their own to participate in various activities and centers that provide more hands-on help for moderate-to-serious memory-impaired adults.

Aspen’s owner and executive director, Gary Staples, a former software-marketing executive who has operated a home-care service — Aspen Senior Care — for the past six years, said he saw the need for a place where disabled seniors can get the daytime help they need to stay active and forestall extreme memory loss.

“Our services also are geared toward those with Parkinson’s disease, those who are wheelchair-bound and those who may be lonely and depressed,” Staples said. Socialization, he said, is key to the quality of life for such folks.

The center is licensed to care for 30 women and 15 men between 9:30 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. The ratio of staff-to-client is 1 to 6.

“As we grow, we will add staff as necessary to maintain that ratio,” he said. His first-year goal is to serve an average of 20 clients per weekday.

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