Alzheimer’s care offers specialty support, care, and sensory stimulation for seniors aging in place.
Sensory stimulation is a huge help for people with Alzheimer’s disease. These activities can be a lot of fun, but there’s more to it than that. Sensory activities engage the different senses, including sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell. These activities help to boost mood, stimulate memory, and improve cognitive functioning. Alzheimer’s care providers can help seniors with Alzheimer’s disease by adding these activities to their daily routines.
Sensory Stimulation Benefits
Engaging in sensory stimulation fires the neurons in different parts of the brain. Smells, sounds, and even tastes can trigger memories and give seniors something to talk about. Engaging the different senses can also elicit positive emotions and help to reduce agitation and anxiety.
Plus, these activities are often fun and enjoyable, so they can promote relaxation and encourage seniors with Alzheimer’s disease to be more social in general.
Visual Stimulation
There are lots of ways that family caregivers and home care providers can help seniors with Alzheimer’s disease engage in visually stimulating activities. Going on a walk in the garden or a local park offers many things to look at, so seniors can talk about the different colors or just the items they see. Looking through old photos together helps to spark memories and storytelling. Even coloring, painting, or other crafts can be a visually stimulating activity.
Auditory Stimulation
All types of sounds can be part of auditory stimulation activities. Nature walks or recordings of nature sounds can be a great idea. Music therapy is another powerful tool. Playing favorite songs or listening to new music can be equally enjoyable. Learning to play an instrument, even a really simple one like the tambourine, offers auditory stimulation.
Tactile Stimulation
Touching all sorts of different objects with different textures can be a great idea, too. Fabrics offer a lot of variation and can be fun for seniors to sift through. Activities like gardening can be tactile, too, because digging through the soil and touching different types of plants can yield a variety of sensations.
Fidget toys may also help because they help seniors keep their hands busy.
Olfactory Stimulation
Smelling new and interesting scents or old familiar ones can be helpful for seniors with Alzheimer’s disease. Aromatherapy is helpful for setting a mood or encouraging seniors to try new activities.
Calming scents in a bath or shower at night can help with bedtime routines, while energizing scents can be invigorating early in the day. Baking or cooking are great activities for olfactory stimulation as well as tactile and culinary stimulation.
Culinary Stimulation
Many seniors with Alzheimer’s disease find that they experience taste differently than they did in the past. Some of this comes with age, but some occur because of changes in how the brain functions. Cooking food together, whether that is old favorite dishes or new recipes, gives seniors a variety of flavors to taste.
Alzheimer’s care providers can help seniors try new things in the kitchen and then enjoy the fruits of their labor.
Tips for Successful Sensory Activities
Choosing activities that seniors enjoy or that align with their hobbies is a great idea. This helps them to stay engaged in the activities and get the most out of them.
Alzheimer’s care providers can help remind everyone involved to keep things simple and straightforward so they don’t become overwhelming. It’s important to pay attention to which activities and sensory experiences seniors enjoy so that they can become routine parts of sensory activities in the future.
Alzheimer’s care providers help seniors find activities that help them enjoy their lives and get the best benefits from what they do. Simple sensory activities can be tremendously comforting and helpful to aging adults with Alzheimer’s disease.
If you or an aging loved one is considering Alzheimer’s Care in Woodbury, NY, please contact the caring staff at Brookville Homecare today. 516-802-7722