World Alzheimer’s Month: The importance of connection
- 11 hours ago
- 2 min read
September is World Alzheimer’s Month, an opportunity to raise awareness, challenge stigma and better understand the experiences of people living with dementia, including Alzheimer’s disease, as well as the whānau and friends who support them.
At The Hearing House, we know how important communication and connection are at every stage of life. For people living with dementia and their loved ones, maintaining those connections can become increasingly important as communication, memory and everyday life change.
For some of our kiritaki/clients, dementia may affect a partner or someone they love. They may find themselves taking on more of a caring and advocacy role – attending appointments, communicating with health professionals, helping their loved one navigate everyday life, and finding ways to maintain the conversations and connections that are such an important part of their relationship.
Our kiritaki Annette Barker experienced this firsthand when her husband, Derek, developed Lewy Body Dementia. Annette became his full-time carer while also navigating a range of healthcare professionals and making difficult decisions for them both. Having received her cochlear implant five years earlier, she has spoken about how much she relied on the confidence and clarity it gave her during this challenging time, saying she simply didn’t know how she would have coped without it.
If you’d like to hear more about Annette’s experience and the role her cochlear implant played in her journey, you can watch a video she shared with the Hearing Institute:
For others, it may be the cochlear implant user themselves who is living with dementia, with partners and whānau playing an increasingly important role in supporting their communication and access to sound.
Dementia can affect memory, language, communication and the way someone experiences the world around them, but it does not diminish the importance of human connection.
Sometimes that connection is found in the simplest things – hearing a familiar voice, sharing a story, listening to music, laughing together or simply being part of the conversation.
This World Alzheimer’s Month, we encourage everyone to kōrero, learn and show compassion as we recognise the experiences of people living with dementia and the whānau and friends who support them. World Alzheimer’s Day is marked on 21 September.
For more information, resources and support relating to dementia in Aotearoa, visit Alzheimers New Zealand, which provides information for people living with dementia and their whānau, as well as details about local support services.
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