WHAT’S it really like to live with dementia?

The social care sector in Pembrokeshire was able to get an idea this week, thanks to a visit from the Virtual Dementia tour bus.

The experience was designed to impair vision, touch and hearing, making it very difficult to interact with the environment.

By depriving participants of their primary senses, the training aimed to stimulate the frustration and anxiety which people who live with the condition face on a daily basis.

The training was organised by Pembrokeshire County Council’s Social Services department and provided by Training 2 CARE (UK) Ltd.

Participants Julie Jones and Linda Hackett said it was very worthwhile.

“I’d like all of my staff to do this training so that we can give our customers the best possible care,” said Julie, senior carer at Havenhurst Day Centre in Milford Haven.

“It really makes you consider your actions and how we actually treat people with dementia.”

Linda, who works in social care and reablement, said: “This will help me with the advice that I can give to carers of people with dementia, as well as giving me more confidence when I’m talking to people with the condition, in that I can understand more of what they’re going through.”

The practical session was followed by a debrief in which participants reflected on their experience and discussed how this could be used in their work.

Councillor Tessa Hodgson met with a number of participants and spoke to them about the training.

She said: It was really interesting to speak to several members of staff who had completed this training and they told me about how the experience had affected them and what they had gained from it.

“Dementia is a complex and often misunderstood illness and anything which adds to the skills of our frontline staff to enable them to better care for some of our most vulnerable residents is to be welcomed and celebrated.”

Diana O’Sullivan, Partnership Co-ordinator for SCWDP (Social Care Workforce Development Programme) Pembrokeshire, organised the training. She said the feedback had been excellent and further sessions had been planned for later this year.

Some of the comments included ‘What I’ve learnt from this is, to get to know someone, give reassurance and help people to have purposeful contact or activity’ and ‘Experiencing what it’s like lets you know why people react the way they do’.