Junior design students give a December presentation, in Martha Van Rensselaer Hall, of their full-scale mock -ups of proposals for apartment-based facilities for Alzheimer's patients and caregivers. Shown here in the bathroom mock-up are, from left to right, students Jean Lee, Simeon Netchev, Jennifer Millard, Professor Gary Evans, Professor Paul Eschelman and his assistant, Jeanne Mercer, and, lower right, student Linda Farher.
By Darryl Geddes
Cornell students are helping a New York City non-profit organization de velop a new approach to providing long-term care for people with Alzheimer's disease.
The organization, Shared Journeys, is investigating new residential care op tions for persons with Alzheimer's disease that will meet the needs of care givers and patients alike. One idea includes the renovation of existing build ings to serve as facilities where people with Alzheimer's and their caregivers would live together. Shared Journeys is studying a section of Manhattan as a pos sible site for a residential care facility.
Shared Journeys made the connection with Cornell through one of its board members, Eric Clay '81, who also is a doctoral student in city and regional plan ning at Cornell. "Shared Journeys saw this opportunity as an excellent way to provide a meaningful professional training experience for students at Cornell," he said.
Students enrolled in two community economic development workshops, taught by Clay, listened to reports and read documents relating to Shared Jour neys' mission before conducting their research. The reports prepared for Shared Journeys included an overview of the costs associated with Alzheimer's care; a survey of resident consumer and business needs for the Manhattan Valley neighborhood (bounded by W. 100th Street, W. 110th Street, Central Park West and Broadway); and an analysis of the physical quality of businesses and housing in the area.
Danielle Arigoni, who is pursuing a master's degree in regional planning, in terviewed caregivers in nursing homes and residential settings for her study evaluating the housing alternatives for people with Alzheimer's.
"There is a need for people with Alzheimer's to have a great deal of social interaction with their caregivers and others, while also remaining as independent as possible," she said.
Arigoni noted that making the person with Alzheimer's feel a part of the activ ity often means including them in such
tasks as preparing meals.
"One caregiver wanted her mother to help make a meal, but instead of doing that in the kitchen -- the normal place for such activity -- the caregiver brought the food out to a different living area so her mother could be away from the dangers of the kitchen," she said. "This approach bothered the mother who perhaps felt that she was not really helping. The task can be made more realistic for the caregiver and person with Alzheimer's by mak ing the kitchen a safer place to be.
"The setting in which a caregiver and a person with Alzheimer's relate can greatly enhance the physical, emotional and mental well-being of everyone," Arigoni said.
Students in the College of Human Ecology's interior design and environ mental psychology programs, under the direction of professors Paul Eshelman and Gary Evans, offered Shared Journeys new design concepts for incorporation in facilities for people with Alzheimer's.
"We developed generic ideas that could be implemented anywhere, by letting the interiors and details grow out of the understanding of the needs of these individuals and their caregivers," said Eshelman.
Students created a corridor for a nursing home or residential care facil ity in which all rooms opening into a hallway were decorated with usable front porch facades.
"These front porch entrances recall a neighborhood setting, while giving each room or apartment its own identity," Eshelman said. "The front porches also
serve as a place for social interactions, a place for these people to sit and view activity taking place in the hall."
Students also designed bathrooms, kitchens and presented an overall apart ment layout that featured views into every room from the kitchen, living room and dining room, thus enabling caregiver and patient alike constant visual access to each other.
"While care is certainly the most important need for a person with Alzheimer's, the environment in which that care is delivered can exacerbate a bad condition or make it better," Eshelman noted.
The experience gained by students in this exercise is vital for their sense of accomplishment and exposure to real-life situations, Clay said.
"Students served as consultants to Shared Journeys in every way," he noted. "They traveled to New York City to speak with caregivers and others and prepared and presented reports," he said. "Their research will live long after their aca demic careers."
Arigoni said the experience of working on this project was extremely reward ing. "Having a client like Shared Journeys made our work seem much more useful and not so purely academic," she said. "It's satisfying to know that our work will be used in a meaningful way and that the information we've generated may be used to help others."
Some of the students' work is already in demand. New York City planners have requested Josie Thompson's survey of the physical quality of businesses and housing stock. Thompson is a second-year master's degree student in City and Regional Planning. Her report suggested ways to make the neighborhood safer.
"What we now have is a solid foundation of information that will move Shared Journeys in the right direction," Clay said. Through their work, the stu dents have demonstrated a need for Shared Journeys' activities and pro vided substantial information for the caregivers and community in which we hope to work in the future."
Clay said the students' reports will be presented to the Shared Journeys' board of directors this month.