Arts and older people in care

The Imagine programme in Nottingham is one of four nationally to be awarded funding as part of Arts Council England and The Baring Foundation’s Arts and older people in care programme

Key consortium partnersThe Abbeyfield Society – lead partner

Nottingham City Council (Arts and Adult Services)

City Arts

The University of Nottingham (research and evaluation)

Care Home Partners (17 in total):

Abbeyfields, Eastgate Care, Nottinghamshire Hospice, Nottingham City Homes and Radford Care Group (day care).

Wider Consortium:

Open Arts Forum (OAF) – representing all of the main arts venues in Nottingham City

University of Nottingham – Mixed Reality Lab – supporting work exploring digital technology

The programme aims to:

Introduce arts practice that challenges, engages, stimulates and enables older people in care to have access to a rich culture offer

 

Define a person centred approach to programming with the voice of older people in care who will become co-commissioners/producers of new work, inform our practice, training and research

Expand the skills, experience and practice of artists, care providers and volunteers to best develop and respond to opportunities for high quality engagement in art

Evaluate outcomes of what is learnt in order to inform and roll out the project to national care providers.

The Imagine programme will consist of artist residencies, commissions and opportunities to see and participate in regular arts activities and events.

It will balance actual visits to and from artists with an exploration of live streaming and facilitated ‘virtual’ visits utilising media and technologies.

 

Programme elements in Year 1:

Armchair Art Gallery

Open Arts Forum – a series of programmes delivered by arts venues in Nottingham City

Nottingham Carnival – creation of a large-scale puppet and a partnership with Men in

Sheds (Age UK Notts) to produce elements for the carnival  

Digital Arts – ipad Engage  

Music commission

Film commission  

Mixed Reality Lab – the digital arts will be explored with residents working in partnership

with Nottingham University

Live streaming - concerts and recitals will be filmed and livestreamed into care settings

Training

The Imagine programme model

The vision uses high quality arts programmes to enrich the lives of older people in care, with the potential to change perceptions about care homes and explore how they might fit better into the community

Through consultation, respond to the residents and care staff’s needs and ideas

Provide opportunities for residents to have choice and control over their environment and participation in high quality arts and cultural activities

Continued … Create an environment that promotes good relationships with family,

partners, friends and staff

Work alongside care staff valuing their expertise and supporting them to raise aspirations in relation to arts engagement and cultural opportunities for residents

Provide training and practical support for care staff, families, volunteers and artists in specialist areas such as dementia, non-verbal communication and other health conditions that may impact on how individual’s can access the different strands of the programme

Support older people in care to seek new opportunities to engage with the programme offer, the wider community and the arts to improve cognitive functioning, communication, enjoyment of life, mood, memory and creative thinking

Where are we now …Care homes/residents engaged since February 2014:

11 care homes engaged

61 workshops facilitated with 286 residents

79 men engaged with the programme and 207 women

 

37 participants from arts venues, artists and care staff have attended training and achieved their Dementia Friends awards

101 likes and

around 6,000 reached through our Imagine Facebook Page

www.facebook.com/ImagineartsNottinghamshire

Baseline Evaluation in Nottingham Care Homes

University of Nottingham: Institute of Mental Health, Centre for Dementia

Bethany Jones, Tom Dening, Justine Schneider, Victoria Tischler

Method • Semi-structured interviews with manager or deputy manager

• Semi structured interview with activity co-ordinator, where applicable

Thematic analysis guided by study areas of enquiry:

• The role of the activities coordinator• Activities in care homes• Art awareness in care homes• Attitudes towards the arts• How care home personnel value the arts• Facilitators and barriers

Findings 1. Existing provision

2. Awareness and attitudes

3. Perceived barriers

4. Expectations and experiences of Imagine Arts so far

Barriers

•Attitudinal

•Financial

•Physical

Conclusions• Existing provision varies with bias towards crafts and occupational

activities

• ‘Art’ tends to come in from outside the home

• Staff attitudes towards all these activities are predominantly instrumental

• Openness towards digital arts

• Cognitive impairment and apathy are perceived to present challenges

• Realism about costs of mainstreaming/implementation

Arts and older people in care

https://www.facebook.com/ImagineartsNottinghamshire

The Abbeyfield Societywww.abbeyfield.com

City Arts: www.city-arts.org.ukhttps://twitter.com/CityArtsNotts

Email Kate Duncan: kate@city-arts.org.uk