Dementia Home Scoops Top Irish Healthcare Centre Awards

Posted on: 26 March 2014

Professor Mary McCarron, Dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences and Professor in Nursing at Trinity College Dublin, was recently recognised for her work and guidance with the design of a Daughters of Charity Service home for people with intellectual disabilities and dementia, as part of the Irish Healthcare Centre Awards.

The Daughters of Charity Service received the 2014 Specialist Care Centre of the Year and the Building Project of the Year Irish Healthcare Centre Awards for Willow View and Meadow View House, a new build home for people with intellectual disabilities and dementia located on their grounds in Dublin. The home is designed to support and respond to the needs and concerns of persons with mid-stage dementia as well as to the complex nursing and palliative needs of persons with late stage dementia.

Professor McCarron was heavily involved in the research and guidance behind the development of the home, culminating in a book which was recently published by Professor McCarron and her colleagues that described the philosophy and critical aspects of the home.

The philosophy underpinning Willow and Meadow View House focuses on failure free enjoyment of life, on maintaining self-identity and ordinary living, promoting meaningful opportunities for communication, welcoming family and community, providing dignity at end of life, and expressing care for staff.

Speaking about her involvement in the design of the home Professor McCarron said: “Willow and Meadow View House is about offering excellence in care, innovation in environmental supports and state of the art programming. It’s not a home that ‘controls and manages’ instead it supports ‘pleasurable activities and satisfying experiences’. I am so pleased to be part of implementing the realization of what we know from research to be the most evidence-based approaches to dementia care but I am also thrilled to have helped ensure Willow and Meadow View House is genuinely people’s home.”

The CEO of the Daughters of Charity Service, Denis Cronin noted the commitment of the Daughters of Charity to “raise the bar” by making the needed changes to support people with intellectual disabilities as they age including needed responses to dementia onset. ” This was why with the guidance of Professor McCarron at Trinity College Dublin we have already supported the development of a memory clinic, and involved staff, family and service users in a strategic plan for dementia which is guiding the redesign of our services “.

A family member of one of the new residents said about the home: “I could never have imagined that there was a place like this, it’s like coming into a new world, the content feeling. I know she is so safe, so happy, so well cared for, it’s a beautiful home, the staff are wonderful. It’s just a dream come through”