In 2007, nationally recognized educator and consultant Erin Bonitto, assisted by her husband, Chris, a successful health care administrator, provided intensive, hands-on training for the Bethel Health Care Centre staff working with people with memory impairment.
Ms. Bonitto’s career began with her first job as a 16-year-old working in the dish room of a nursing home in her small hometown in Minnesota. A certified activity director who holds a master’s degree in gerontology, Bonitto founded Gemini Consulting in 1998 and has presented workshops at more than 300 conferences. Gemini Consulting offers specific consulting and training packages to assist long-term care providers who desire to move away from a rigid, medical model of care to less-institutional models.
The objective of the training is to help professional caregivers in nursing homes and memory-care facilities provide people with Alzheimer’s Disease the highest possible quality of life – ensuring that every day is filled with moments that matter.
The focus of Bonitto’s training was assisting staff in creating an Alzheimer’s lounge program, with activity stations where residents may interact with other residents and with selected three-dimensional items to elicit memories, and provide moments of genuine pleasure, purpose and meaning. These items include:
- painting wood blocks and birdhouses
- arranging silk flowers
- looking at and creating scrapbooks of colorful pictures
- folding colored socks, baby clothes or granny squares
- touching, sorting and trying on colorful jewelry
- caring for life-sized dolls, complete with an authentic cradle and a rocking chair
As a result of implementing Bonitto’s programs, residents with memory impairment often experience “clinical” improvement results:
- fewer falls
- less psychotropic, mood-altering medication use
- less agitation and anxiety
- improved appetite
- improved sleep-cycle patterns
- fewer “aggressive” or “combative” types of responses
All staff attended a half-day educational seminar presented by Bonitto.
With biographical information submitted to the local newspaper, The Newton Kansan, Erin Bonitto praised Kidron Bethel:
“How incredibly impressed I have been with everyone and everything at Kidron Bethel. I travel all across the country, providing training in all types of retirement communities, nursing homes and memory-care centers. For almost nine years I've had a chance to visit the best of the best, and sometimes, the worst of the worst! I've shared with the leadership and staff here – and would love to share with the whole world – that Kidron Bethel truly is one of the "best of the best." In every way, the folks here truly demonstrate a deep and personal commitment to their residents. I suspect the whole Newton community has always known they have such a gem. It's been a joy for me to find this gem in the heart of Kansas and to collaborate with them on this project.”
The training by Bonitto was made possible by a gift from the Charles Harness estate.
