Increasing calm and comfort

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Some small studies have found aromatherapy and massage appeared to calm patients with dementia, and a few suggested that patients’ cognitive scores improved after therapy — though not nearly enough to alter the course of the disease. So far, the research isn’t strong enough to say conclusively that patients benefit from the therapies, but they also aren’t likely to experience side effects that would call for caution.

Jennifer Robinson, who works for Lifetime Wellness at multiple Oklahoma nursing homes, said one of their successes is a program called Comfort and Life Memories (CALM). The program includes relaxing music or nature sounds, flameless candles, aromatherapy and hand massages for those who want them. Most residents, including those without dementia, participate once or twice a week, though some people with agitation need it more often, she said.

Residents are more likely to make eye contact and talk about their lives after participating in the program, said Alicia Connor Todd, clinical liaison and director of marketing at Tulsa Nursing Center and Villages at Southern Hills Skilled, and Assisted Living Villages at Southern Hills. They also tend to have better appetites, sleep more soundly and report less pain, she said.

“The best way to overcome aging and illness and pain is to replace all of those negative stimuli with positive stimuli,” she said. “It won’t make it go away, but it can make it better.”

The idea is to use the program with other therapies like gentle exercise, dance, social activities, crafts and religious activities to meet the range of residents’ physical and emotional needs, Robinson said.

“We want to keep them at their highest level of functioning possible,” she said. “We try to wellround the person so it’s not all about bingo.”

Having a variety of activities is important because people have different interests, and they vary in what memories and abilities they retain longest as their diseases progress, Sims said. The most important thing is to make them feel comfortable, she said.

Painting “is just another tool that we have,” she said. “Some tools work for some people with dementia, and some don’t.”

[PHOTOS BY MEG WINGERTER, THE OKLAHOMAN] Pat Heyland, who lives at Touchmark at Coffee Creek in Edmond, pauses to talk while working on a painting of snowflakes. The painting program includes aromatherapy to improve the moods of residents who have dementia, and encourages conversation to...