As a part of my job I volunteer for a local non-profit organization that promotes advocacy and awareness for people with disabilities. It is a group of professionals and consumers. One of my professional contacts, who works with adults with acquired brain injuries at a Rehab Center, approached me about solving our area's adult day care program problem. The problem is we only have one, but it is for the elderly general population; it is not equiped to handle the special needs of people with dementia and it is not appropriate for the younger people with the various types of dementia. Her solution is to work together through our organization and existing community resources to develop a program for our area. She has some good thoughts and ideas, but asked for my imput because she knows about my DH. I told her I had a wonderful, extensive resource in all of you. I did a general search on this site and have read the threads about some of the experiences with adult day care programs.
So, what I am asking is:
1--for specific recommendations about what you think works or doesn't work 2--based on your experience with your LO, what would be the ideal adult day care program to help you? 3--any information you think we should know.
The Adult Day Care center my wife attends is one of the best I have seen. It is a "medical" model, which means the staff is trained to give medication and personal care ( showers). This one is open to adults of any age with any type of disability. One client is a man with Down's Syndrome, who also has developed Alzheimer's. There are a couple of women whose only "disability" is that they are getting old and can't get around very well. They are mentally alert. And, of course, there are several with Alzheimer's. For detailed information on how the center is set up you can contact:
Anne Osssanna, LSW Friendship Cottage P.O. Box 1107 Blue Hill, ME 04614 207-374-5612 aossanna@whcacap.org
Stephanie, if you'll go to http://www.nbbd.com/npr/joesclub/index.html you'll find lots of good information about Joe's Club, which my DW attends whenever I need some personal time. That website site also provides links to more web pages dealing with other services provided by the local Alzheimer's Foundation established in our county twelve years ago by a retired Navy Commandwer, Joe Steckler. I'm sure he'd be more than happy to share with you what all he had to go through to get things working as well as they are now.