Tranquil Strategies for Fighting Dementia in the Netherlands

The Netherlanders have an alternative and peaceful strategy to treat dementia patients. The unorthodox treatment includes harnessing the power of relaxation, childhood memories, sensory aids, soothing music, family structure and other tools to heal, calm and nurture them instead of relying on medication, bed rests, and possible restraints. Dementia, a group of related syndromes, can be a steep decline in brain function that steals memories and personalities of the inflicted.

“The more stress is reduced, the better,” said Dr. Erik Scherder, a neuropsychologist at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and one of the country’s best-known dementia care specialists. In the 1990s, the Dutch started thinking differently about how to treat the disease, moving away from a medicalized approach that simply treated clients as hospital patients.

Katja Ebben, who is the intensive care manager at Vitalis Peppelrode, a home in Eindhoven, said she had noticed that with the newer techniques, patients need less medication and fewer physical restraints. Willy Briggen, 89, lives at the Eindhoven home and is subject to outbursts due to her advanced dementia. A decade ago the staff may have medicated her to calm her, but now they roll a squat projector into her room, where it beams out calming images and plays soothing sounds.

See Christopher F. Schuetze, Look at These Unusual Strategies for Fighting Dementia, New York Times, August 22, 2018.

Special thanks to Lewis Saret (Attorney, Washington, D.C.) for bringing this article to my attention.