‘Give Them Us!’, The Arts In Dementia Care
Keywords
Nursing home residents, quality of life, dementia, art appreciation
Despite much investigation into the quality of nursing homes, the needs of residents from their own perspective seems poorly understood. In this article, interview data collected from Westminster Health Care Centre explored the principles of quality of life for residents in nursing homes with dementia. The discussion substantiated the hypothesis that the positive effects of art-making result in improvements to care-giving outcomes. Concepts raised were aesthetic sensibility, appreciation and taste in accordance with the genuine desire for artistic pursuits. This article conclusively illustrates the intention from this sample of nursing home residents, to live more creatively. (pp 19-20)