MUSIC & MEMORY

WASHBURN — A pair of Gouldian finches live inside an aviary at the Northern Lights Nursing Home and sing all day long. Recently 20 residents with dementia who are participating in a program called Memory & Music are also starting to sing.

A national program called Music & Memory has swept the nation, and Northern Lights Services, Inc.(NLS) in Washburn has been swept up into it. In September, NLS, a non-profit facility which includes a nursing home, assisted living apartments and a rehab center, was awarded a grant through the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS) to become trained and certified in the Music & Memory program. The idea is to introduce personalized music to residents with dementia. DHS hopes to certify all 397 skilled nursing facilities in the state, but in this first round only 100 were selected out of 230 applicants.

In January, a package arrived at the Northern Lights Nursing Home. Inside were 15 iPod Shuffles, headphones and AC adapters; two headphone splitters and a set of external speakers; as well as a $150 iTunes gift card and technical assistance and support to launch the Music & Memory program — a package valued at over $2,000. After one and a-half months of implementing these new toys — loading iPods with personalized music for participants — the results are astounding.

“We’ve seen such a positive change in our residents,” said Jessica Porter, Director of Resident Life at Northern Lights and manager of the program, “so much so that staff is asking, ‘Do you have another iPod for this person?’”

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MUSIC & MEMORY