Immediate Past President Phil Burgess called Geoff Breust to the podium to introduced the guest speaker, Isabel Baker. Isabel started her speech with a bit of her background: nurse, midwife and in the ‘80’s started working with dementia patients. She said that there are one hundred different diseases that affect the mental wellbeing of patients. She used the term “therapeutic fibbing” to help stabilize the behavior of an agitated patient. She talked about various examples: why a female may get agitated at 3 pm ... she is used to picking up school kids, making dinner, etc. A gentleman wanted to get up at 4 am and he was a dairy farmer and it was time to milk the cows. So, the staff found the name of a person who helped with the milking and through “therapeutic fibbing” would tell the gentleman that so and so was taking care of it. Isabel gave the example of a gentleman who fought having his shirt removed and found out that he was a former rodeo rider and had many injuries to his shoulders and clavicle. She recommended that everyone in the audience write down their likes and dislikes in their care plan to help in their care in the later stages of their life. Isabel has written a book titled The A to Z of Dementia Care and it will be for sale in book stores at the end of the year. After comments and questions from the audience, PP Phil presented Isabel with a bottle of Olive oil. |