My wife has Alzheimer's and was having great difficulty telling the time.all sadly very normal with the desease.on the advice of mental health a dementia clock was purchased showing time,date,and parts of the day and night i.e. morning,afternoon,evening and night. All very sensible and seemingly good advice, now to my point as very often happens we do not or cannot see things through the eyes of the sufferer. My wife just sees these large numbers i.e. 1.30am 3.oo pm etc. But these are sadly just numbers and does not tell her it is 30minutes to tea time.ten minutes to bed time ,almost time for visitor to arrive. She sometimes reads say 3.20 pm as 20pm not for some reason seeing the large number 3. I wonder if others have purchased these quite expensive items thinking it would solve the problem of telling the time.please don't read this and think I am being negative because to some early sufferers these clocks will be a gift from heaven, but not the magic cure for advanced sufferers.
Dementia clocks
- Thread starter slim-jim
- Start date
I had a similar experience with my partner. I thought it might help him realise it was the middle of the night and stop him getting up. He couldn’t read the numbers so it was quickly consigned to a drawer. There are a number of gadgets around to help dementia sufferers but unfortunately once they reach a certain point they are of no use.
Sad, isn't it? So often people think dementia is just about memory loss but don't realise understanding is lost too. The clock you describe is a brilliant idea, as you obviously thought when you bought it! It's brilliant for someone who just needs a gentle reminder but most people with dementia quickly go beyond that point and can no longer interpret the numbers or even understand time itself...
I remember my mum would say it was '4 past 20' and not realise it made no sense. Neither did she have a clue what she should be doing at 4 past 20... I remember sitting on the green opposite her care home on a sunny afternoon. She asked what time it was (many, many times!) and when I told her 3 o'clock, she asked if that was 3 in the morning or 3 o'clock at night?
A lot of really well-meaning people are trying to use technology to help people with dementia, which is great.... However, they never seem to realise the limitations of these things or all the things they take for granted a person will still understand. Dementia takes away understanding and also makes learning new things next to impossible.
I remember my mum would say it was '4 past 20' and not realise it made no sense. Neither did she have a clue what she should be doing at 4 past 20... I remember sitting on the green opposite her care home on a sunny afternoon. She asked what time it was (many, many times!) and when I told her 3 o'clock, she asked if that was 3 in the morning or 3 o'clock at night?
A lot of really well-meaning people are trying to use technology to help people with dementia, which is great.... However, they never seem to realise the limitations of these things or all the things they take for granted a person will still understand. Dementia takes away understanding and also makes learning new things next to impossible.
I bought one of these clocks about 18 months ago, and my OH used to look at it regularly, but now, he doesn’t know if it’s morning or afternoon, and although he wears a watch, he cannot always tell the time. I also have a landline with big buttons and pictures of the family, so all he has to do is press the right picture and he gets through to his sons or brother, but he doesn’t use that now either. Techno things are beyond him now.
we have one and he does look at it and knows but hes not so far along. he doesnt like the nagging woman that, when programmed, sounds the alerts. i had to have treatment at a hospital so used the prompts for eating, drinking and weve never programmed it again. i think that he rather likes a break from "nagging women"
When my Mum was at a moderate stage of Alzheimers, she could tell the time, but no distinction between AM & PM
We used to go grocery shopping at 9am every Wednesday. As my parents lived behind me, one night on a Wednesday at 9pm, she’s knocking on my door ready to go shopping!
I bought her a Dementia clock that showed the time in analogue, the day, and also the background would have the Sunshine for “ Morning” “Afternoon” and darkened Sky for “ Evening ” and Moon from 8pm to 6am. ( you could adjust times to suit)
First few days Mum thought it was fantastic, and was doing well and I felt pleased with myself.
Then one morning I go over and Mums staring intently at the clock, a bag of nerves.
“When’s it going to change”
She had become fixated on the background changing from Sun to sky to Moon, and it was causing her anxiety.
I had to take it away.
We used to go grocery shopping at 9am every Wednesday. As my parents lived behind me, one night on a Wednesday at 9pm, she’s knocking on my door ready to go shopping!
I bought her a Dementia clock that showed the time in analogue, the day, and also the background would have the Sunshine for “ Morning” “Afternoon” and darkened Sky for “ Evening ” and Moon from 8pm to 6am. ( you could adjust times to suit)
First few days Mum thought it was fantastic, and was doing well and I felt pleased with myself.
Then one morning I go over and Mums staring intently at the clock, a bag of nerves.
“When’s it going to change”
She had become fixated on the background changing from Sun to sky to Moon, and it was causing her anxiety.
I had to take it away.
My dad also has vascular dementia. I bought him a dementia clock because he was getting up at stupid o’clock. He was fascinated that it could tell him whether it was morning, afternoon and evening, day and night. My dads dementia has progressed a lot over the summer and he hasn’t really been able to understand the clock.
just a word of warning about taking that break. My dad went to stay with my sister for a couple of days. He was really looking forward to it. However, whilst he was there he was disoriented and confused, especially at night. It had a knock on effect, when he came home he didn Know where he was, where the toilet or bathroom was, where his bedroom was etc. He is settled again now but it has taken a good few weeks.
just a word of warning about taking that break. My dad went to stay with my sister for a couple of days. He was really looking forward to it. However, whilst he was there he was disoriented and confused, especially at night. It had a knock on effect, when he came home he didn Know where he was, where the toilet or bathroom was, where his bedroom was etc. He is settled again now but it has taken a good few weeks.
I bought two clocks for my Mum about 8 years ago - one in her bedroom for use at night and one in the living room for use during the day. On a basic level she still uses each clock regularly and tends to use it to check that she has her memory calendar open to the correct day. Although she can still read the time, the actual passage of time is becoming increasingly meaningless. On a practical level, I had to disconnect the alarm prompts because they were no longer providing any assistance whatsoever and changed the type of clock she was using because she found the pictures of the sun & moon confusing.
My mother has macular degeneration as well as dementia. When I noticed she was having difficulty with understanding when she should be places, I got her a very simple talking clock as I thought that would help. She claimed to be delighted with it, but next time I visited she'd hidden it as she thought it was demeaning, making her feel like she was a child. I then discovered she could read her very big wall clock. So she could tell me it was eleven o'clock and she knew that she had a keep fit class at two o'clock. She couldn't then work out that that was three hours away so there was no need to walk up to the hall five minutes away just yet.
Hi .yes I do understand the problem of going visiting even for the day.as the rest of the day up to bed time can be really trying as confusion reigns, I guess when a sufferer is taken out of their regular surroundings it really does confuse them.I am like many others I suspect torn between taking your loved one out and keeping them in their known surroundings.
I genuinely believe that an awful lot depends on what the person with dementia was like before.
If they were really well organised, they cope better and for longer with the maintenance of a rigid routine - that includes friends/family visiting at set times.
If they were less organised prior to the onset of dementia, trying to establish a familiar routine is almost meaningless and attempting to undertake anything unfamiliar is almost guaranteed to increase confusion.
