Palmerston Care Home in East Belfast wins ‘inspirational achievement in dementia” award

Abbeyfield and Wesley’s Palmerston Care Home in East Belfast (9/17 Palmerston Road, Belfast BT4 1QA)has received a top award at a prestigious awards ceremony in Belfast.

The team at Palmerston was awarded ‘Inspirational Achievement in Dementia Related Activities and Alternative Therapies’ at the Staff Nursing Care Awards 2017 at Stormont Hotel, Belfast.

The awards, which celebrate best practice in the care home sector, were sponsored by Staff Nursing Ltd, which provides registered nurses and healthcare assistants to nursing and residential homes in Northern Ireland. The awards were in aid of Alzheimer’s Society.

According to the award organisers, the accolade acknowledges an organisation, single home or individual that has pioneered a proactive strategy of using activities and therapies designed to engage and stimulate people living with dementia. The award category was open to a group of staff or individual activity therapist who has championed a successful programme related to dementia care, and who has evidenced exceptional results in promoting the wellbeing of residents.

Mrs Geraldine Gilpin, Chief Executive of Abbeyfield & Wesley Housing Association, which owns and manages Palmerston Care Home, discusses:

“We are delighted that the pioneering work in our Palmerston Dementia Care Home has been recognised in this way. Our success is all down to the excellence and dedication of our team in delivering first class care for our residents, being open to new ways of working and continually adapting to the meet the differing and changing needs of each resident.”

Marsha Tuffin, Manager of Care Home & Dementia Services at Palmerston Care Home, and a previous winner of Dementia Personality of the Year at the UK Dementia Awards, explains the importance of having a wide variety of activities and stimuli within Palmerston Care Home:

“Residents in Palmerston live a quality life. With specialist support and care they often regain lost skills, are empowered and regain a sense of purpose and identity.  By focusing on the person first, and then the dementia, the caring team provides residents with daily living activities, which keep the mind and body stimulated and active.

“It is important to recognise that Palmerston is about creating different environments for different people. Everybody is an individual and everybody’s dementia is different. Each of our residents is at a different stage of dementia and needs a different stage of care and assistance. It is therefore important to have a range of activities and solutions for these various stages.”

Palmerston Care Home is a purpose built care provision located on the Palmerston Road in East Belfast. The 38 bed facility incorporates 20 dementia beds and 18 residential beds. Palmerston Residential Home caters for people who may be; frail elderly; require dementia care; have a physical disability; have a sensory impairment and are unable to live independently.  There are two separate wings within Palmerston Care Home, one for those with advanced dementia (the Lewis wing) and the other for frail elderly people who may have less advanced dementia.

For further information log onto www.abbeyfieldandwesley.org.uk or telephone Abbeyfield & Wesley Society on 028 93363558.