Abstract:

In many ways, dementia has become a dominant modern cultural image of becoming elderly. Intricately bound up with popular ideas about this condition are notions of hopelessness, loss, meaninglessness and perhaps most profoundly, the suggestion that the person is wholly lost to the illness; that all that is left is a shell of the person who used to reside within it. This paper attempts to offer a challenge to some of these stereotypical ideas by presenting a model of dementia care which focuses on the development of the personhood of the individual rather than the deficits which are brought about by the ravages of the condition. It will be shown that even in the midst of confusion, there stands a person made in God's image, and as such in need of love, understanding and the warmth of human relationship.

Author: Eric Stoddart