From “Grazers” to “Continual Bathers”—Practical Approaches to Meet Hygiene Needs of People With Late Stage Dementia

In a previous post, I outlined the concept behind my Grazers Program for clients with dementia. Grazers sets the framework for a collaborative facility approach to managing deficits in attention and wandering behavior common for people with late-stage dementia. These behaviors can lead to unintentional weight loss and compromised nutritional status, so I came up with Grazers to meet those patients where they are with healthy snacks. If speech-language pathologists can teach caregivers ways to successfully engage people with late-stage dementia and increase their nutritional opportunities throughout the day, why can’t we apply this concept to other areas, such as bathing? Luckily for us, we can! As a complementary program to Grazers, I introduced the concept of “Continual Bathers.” My goal with this program is to help caregivers view the act of bathing as a process that can also be segmented and completed over a longer period, possibly reducing stress and refusal of care. Just like the Grazers program, the Continual Bathers program uses an initial episode of skilled intervention by an SLP, with an occupational or physical therapist, as needed, to determine functional barriers to bathing. Then, we apply a continual bather approach for clients who experience adverse reactions to assisted bathing. In this approach, I view the act of bathing as a large task with multiple sub-components that patients can complete in isolation. So what would a typical Continual Bather day look...
Source: American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) Press Releases - Category: Speech-Language Pathology Authors: Tags: Speech-Language Pathology dementia Health Care skilled nursing facility Source Type: blogs