[ExI] VR for dementia care

[spike]

>...From: extropy-chat [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On
Behalf Of spike
...


>... On Behalf Of BillK
Subject: [ExI] VR for dementia care

This is a marvellous use for virtual reality!

<http://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-virtual-reality-is-transforming-dem
entia-care-in-australia/>

How virtual reality is transforming dementia care in Australia...
-----------
BillK

_______________________________________________


Thanks BillK.  As you know, this is a topic which has been on my mind for
some time.
...
Go Australians!  We are cheering for ya, mates!

spike  _______________________________________________


>From BillK's article:

... an elderly Italian gentleman cried when they removed the goggles from
him. When asked why he was so emotional, he said that he had given up ever
returning to Venice, and he had felt like he was there in a gondola...

This comment reminded me of an experience that happened a quarter century
ago but I remember it like it happened yesterday.  In college I worked at a
nursing home, that wing back there (details needed?  Didn't think so) night
shift.  Ten years later, my bride's grandfather was a patient in that
nursing home and was in that wing back there.  In the early 80s, they had no
TV (they thought there was no point in it (dammit)) but by the early 90s,
some sane kindhearted soul had made some fundamental changes.  They had a
big-screen TV (rare in those days, a big very expensive CRT) in a commons
area and a number of seats and places for wheelchairs.  Someone had recorded
a bunch of episodes of the Waltons, cut out all the commercials and placed
them continuously end to end on a video tapes.  They played continuously
round the clock (AD patients don't always sleep at night.)

We visited, he commented "I had dinner today with the nicest family.  They
have a sawmill and the oldest son is called John Boy and their daughters are
Mary Ellen, Esther, Erin Elizabeth... etc.  

I am not a Waltons trivia expert but he named the children accurately enough
for me to realize he had learned the names of the characters accurately and
recited them later, this after having been deep in what we thought was
end-stage AD.  That happened in 1992 but I can't get it out of my mind.  His
damaged brain was still able to experience and still able to remember.  I
think had we known, we might have been able to keep him home with nothing
more sophisticated than a VCR.

spike