Two New Brunswick women with years of experience in the nursing home field have launched a new business that aims to provide support for dementia caregivers.
Ashley King and Daphne Noonan started “Person Centred Universe” several years ago as a way to assist nursing home workers in caring for those with dementia.
“People were organically coming to us or we were providing leadership in a number of ways,” explained King.
Realizing the need was greater than just those in the traditional nursing home setting, they recently decided to branch out and provide the service for those caring for their loved ones as well.
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“What we do is provide a tailored lifestyle plan that really helps access the hundreds of different services at the right time,” King said.
“We see a better world for individuals living with dementia.”
“There are tons of wonderful services that can be accessed through government, subsidy and through organizations such as the Alzheimer Society,” Noonan said. “A lot of times people don’t know what they don’t know so part of what this service could help with is essentially that system navigation piece.”
All patients suffering from dementia are unique as hundreds of forms of the disease have been found.
Using assessment tools created by the United States Alzheimer Association, Person Centred Universe intends to develop individual guidelines for sufferers’ families to take away some of the stress associated with their care.
“We’ll go through that with the family and identify, I guess, what we might consider the top three or four burning fires based on that assessment process,” explained Noonan.
“Every family unit is different.”
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As leaving the house, or even bringing new people in, can sometimes pose a difficulty for sufferers, Person Centred Universe plans to conduct their assessments and discussions over the phone and through the use of Skype or Facetime.
They’re beginning beta testing with a handful of caregivers and expect to be fully operational shortly after they’ve completing their initial work with those families.
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