By Lisa Schick

Recreation therapists keep residents active Herb Basset Home

Feb 13, 2011 | 10:30 AM

The residents of the Herb Basset Home smiled and clapped for the Gramps as they played upbeat polka music Thursday afternoon.

One of the women who works with the residents of the centre even got some of them dancing.

Music therapy is just one of the ways recreation therapists help the people they work with.

Jen McDougal is a recreation therapist at the Herb Basset home and she said they try to keep residents as active and involved as they were before they went into long-term care.

“Just because you’re in a nursing home doesn’t mean that your life has to end. There’s a stereotype out there and we’re trying really hard to change that,” said McDougal.

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These therapists use recreation and leisure to help residents improve their physical and mental abilities, increase confidence and self-esteem, strengthen social skills and relationships and to improve all-around quality of life.

Therapy can include anything from trips to farms, to physical activity like bowling, to getting them out of their room and interacting with other residents, or even just emotional support.

McDougal said their main goal is to alleviate the residents of the three plagues in long-term care: loneliness, helplessness and boredom.

“We’re keeping people’s lives going with quality.”

McDougal has seen recreation therapy do very good things for a lot of people.

She remembers one resident who would only sit in her room, not interacting with other people and wait for her three meals a day.

But when McDougal introduced her to painting by giving her a canvas and a brush, she turned into a different person.

“She changed dramatically because she was encouraged to do something she’d never done in her entire life. (She) started to smile more, started to stay out of her room – it was a huge change in her.”

This was when McDougal said she knew she was doing the right thing.

McDougal has been a recreation therapist for seven years and has known she wanted to help the elderly since she was a teen.

“I’ve been volunteering since I was thirteen and seeing people sitting lonely in their rooms at the end of their life was something I couldn’t take. And I found that recreation therapy gave me the opportunity to have that one on one special connection with the residents,” McDougal said.

Recreation therapy is under ever-increasing demand according to McDougal, “People are starting to understand how important (this therapy) is.”

She said recreation therapy is being more and more recognized for its health benefits and as people get more active it is going to be in even higher demand for people being active later in life.

The week of Feb. 7 to 13 has been set aside as a week to recognize the contributions of recreation therapy, as recreation therapy awareness week.

lschick@panow.com