Saturday 6 April 2013

ALZHEIMER’S : A DIFFERENT VIEW

SEEING ALZHEIMER'S DIFFERENTLY 


For more than a decade, US sociologist Cathy Greenblat has been travelling the world studying the treatments offered to people with dementia. Her mother and two of her grandparents all developed the disease - and she wanted to understand more about the condition.


In her book - Love, Loss and Laughter - she tells positive stories of ageing, dementia and end-of-life treatment, across seven countries. Take a look at some of her touching images here, as she explains what she discovered with her exhibition of 84 poignant photographs demonstrating a new global approach to caring for people with Alzheimer's and other dementias, sharply disputing the stereotype of dementia patients as "empty shells".

The people, Cathy Greenblat photographed, all are receiving an emerging kind of care that treats the person, not just the “patient.” Her compelling, compassionate photographs reveal that such care encourages people with Alzheimer’s to sustain connections to others, and to their own past lives, at a far higher level than is generally believed possible. Greenblat, who lost her maternal grandparents and mother to Alzheimer’s, captures moments of joy as well as sorrow, and shows that people with Alzheimer’s who are treated as whole human beings in positive environments can still give and receive great love, and share moments of hearty laughter.


An exhibition of images from Love Loss and Laughter will begin a seven month tour of Australia on 14 May 2013.

To hear Cathy Greenblat speaking about her photograph, click on this link->

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-21862859

Photographs and text by Cathy Greenblat, foreword by Princess Yasmin Aga Khan and endorsed by ADI, Alzheimer’s Disease International.

The book can be purchased from amazon.com.


(Source:  BBC News Health, 26 March 2013,  Alzheimer's Australia NSW Library, 4 April 2013)

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