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Sensory Book

Project Period
March 2019 - September 2020

Role
Design Researcher - Project Leader

Performance

  • Project management

  • Facilitating user study activities

  • Prototyping & Production

Project Goal

This project aims to design portable and interactive cognitive training activity tools for people with dementia who cannot benefit from cognitive training activity services in daily life.

The Growth in Numbers of People with Dementia

The prevalence rates of dementia in Hong Kong are estimated to be at 5%~8% among persons over 65 and at 20%~30% among over 80.

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Available Activities for People with Dementia

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Multi-sensory Environment (MSE)

Multi-sensory Environment is one of the focused sensory activities in dementia care services that aim to stimulate their five senses: sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell. It provides sensory stimulation and reduces sensory demand.

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Montessori

The Montessori method for dementia is a pedagogy to personalise meaningful activity, especially for people with dementia. This method aims to provide an opportunity to become independent, enjoy high self-esteem and build a promising future.

Interview with the Care Professionals

I conducted the group interview with the social workers and occupational therapists about the home care service for the dementia community. 

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Persona

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“Even though we design and deliver the home exercise and cognitive training activity, we cannot check up whether clients with dementia do exercise and activity consistently at home.”

Chelsea
Age/ 28
Occupational therapist

"Apart from the fixed plan like going to the park and visiting the centre, we normally stay at home with Ms Wong."

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Adriana
Age/ 34
Domestic Helper
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“Even though my mother has a domestic helper, I prefer to monitor my mother’s condition every day.”

Ming
Age/ 49
An office worker  (Family member)

User Journey of Home Care Service

ASSESSMENT
Targets?
People with dementia 
  • Medical history
  • MoCA assessment
Caregivers & Family
members
  • Asking about the living patterns of people with dementia
Device?
  • Paper
  • Test of limbs and balance
DESIGNING THE
PERSONALISED 
ACTIVITY WITH
CARE WORKERS
Targets?
People with dementia 
  • Cognitive Training
  • Sensory Stimulation
Care workers visit home for the activity every two times per week, for one hour.
Device?
  • Sensory Tools
  • Ipad
  • Cards
MANAGING 
CLIENTS
Targets?
People with dementia ​
Home visit every once a month but can be frequent visit depending on the situation of clients
Half-year review to family members and informal caregivers
Upgrading and down-grading the level of activity
CONSISTENT
HOME CARE
SERVICE
PROVISION

Pain Point

  • Non-age appropriate activity tools for people with dementia.
     
  • Limited guidelines on how to interact with people with dementia through activity for non-care professionals.
     
  • Heavy workload and lack of time for care professionals.
     

How might we help people with dementia to have the interactive cognitive training activity at home? 

Solutions

  • Non-care professionals such as family members and informal caregivers can have meaningful interaction with the Sensory Book.
     
  • People with dementia who are on the waiting list of activity services can get the benefit of stimulation and activity consistently.
     
  • Care professionals can track clients with dementia's history of stimulation and activity.
     

Ideation Workshops

I had the three stages of ideation workshops with the social workers and occupational therapists to develop the portable interactive cognitive training activity tools for people with dementia.

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Prototyping

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Sensory Book Design Concept

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Providing an instruction of activity & information on the functions of sensory stimulation and cognitive training.

Assessing a person with dementia's activity performance through observation note.

User Scenario with Sensory Book

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The person with dementia and the informal caregiver or family members is introduced to Sensory Book by the care centre, friends or advertisement.

Be Aware

The informal caregiver or family member creates a person with dementia's account with personal information and the service provides personalised programmes for the person with dementia.

Register

Engage

The informal caregiver or family member can guide and interact with the person with dementia through the mobile application.

As they use the service more, they organise group activities with local users of Sensory Book.

Socialise

Exam

All the information and history of the person with dementia's performance will be logged and shared with the care professionals in the annual MoCA examination.

The informal caregiver or family member regularly catch up with the care centre and get advised to plan for the next steps and the app is updated with new programmes.

Update

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