A regular, open event for 3 weeks each Friday at 10am-12pm at our office, this June we kicked off the campaign in a series of workshops that were open to all to attend.
As part of Home Instead UK’s mission to expand the world’s capacity to care, we joined our offices across the country in the Key to Care campaign in an effort to start conversations in our community and offer valuable help to those in need.
A regular and open event for 3 weeks each Friday at 10am-12pm at our Sheffield North office, we kicked off the campaign on the 9th of June in a series of workshops that were open to all in the community to attend.
The aim of these sessions was to connect with people and open up the care conversation, offering them valuable guidance and support. We invited several people from the community in Sheffield to come along, such as people who were wanting to learn more about a particular topic (e.g. Dementia, Parkinson’s) or family members of loved ones who they thought may be needing some care or help.
Joined by Elsie from Age UK Sheffield and Beth from Sheffield United Community Foundationwe kicked off our first workshop to a great start.
This session focused on all things related to dementia, first introducing the disease and its causes and history. Then, we discussed the many different types of dementia and how they differ from each other – an element of the disease that many people don’t often know about. It was also interesting to see how nutrition and fluids can help people to live well with dementia, this was echoed in Elsie’s talk which showed how Age UK focus on supporting people’s quality of life with dementia.
Joined by Nicky and Sue from Parkinson’s UK, both of whom live with Parkinson’s themselves, this session was incredibly eye-opening. We also invited the daughter of one of our Parkinson’s clients here at Home Instead, so that she too could share her experiences of the disease and how it has affected her mum for over 40 years.
Attendees also included some of our Care Pros who came along to learn about signs of Parkinson’s so that they could be more informed when with their clients, as well as a family who’s dad was recently diagnosed and were looking for more guidance and advice on how to cope.
Our final workshop focused on how we can promote healthy nutrition in older adults; covering what exactly ‘nutritional care’ is, how elders can stay healthy and the best foods, vitamins and fluids for them.
Healthy nutrition is ever-important to help us age well. It’s also important for people living with dementia, diabetes or even cancer – people tend to focus on the obvious risk factors that we know can cause cancer, like smoking or obesity. However, what you eat can significantly reduce your risk of developing common cancers.
We were pleased to be joined by some academics in the field, as well as carers who were looking to enhance their knowledge.
If you'd be interested in a free talk at your business, organisation, charity, church or community group, feel free to get in touch! Call 0114 246 9666 or email [email protected]