The white-haired German woman in the easy chair has vivid memories of hardline communist leader Erich Honecker and even Adolf Hitler, but is not always sure who Angela Merkel is.
Margit Hikisch, 88, is a resident at the Alexa nursing home in the eastern city of Dresden where pockets of German history are being brought to life to help treat dementia patients.
Using an innovative approach, the private facility has set up “memory rooms” with the decor, meals and music of East Germany of the 1960s and 1970s which, it says, help revive old memories and with them the residents’ sense of self.
Photo: AFP
Hikisch survived the war’s devastation in Dresden and spent what she calls her “best years” under the communist regime of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) working as a bank clerk.
“Hitler was a madman and we suffered during the war and afterwards, but in the GDR it got better little by little — we had enough to eat again,” Hikisch said. “We were always satisfied with what we had [under communism], maybe because we didn’t know what we didn’t have because of the border.”
Zimmer frames and wheelchairs are parked in front of a miniature replica of an East German “Intershop” where high-quality products such as Western-brand coffee and chocolates are on offer.
Photo: AFP
A box contains a picture of Honecker that was ubiquitous in the GDR and play money with Karl Marx’s bearded visage on East German marks. Residents hum along to cheery old pop tunes coming from a record player.
The home’s director Gunter Wolfram, 48, said immersion in the yesteryear bric-a-brac had shown “dramatic results” in boosting patients’ spirits and mobility.
“Objects from a certain time spark very strong emotions. We are very interested in those feelings because they can be a key to treatment,” he said.
“We noticed that people emerge from lethargy are suddenly able to butter their own bread rolls, eat and drink more, go to the bathroom on their own, and are friendlier and more interested in their environment,” he added.
The original relics of East German life were unearthed on eBay and in flea markets, but the care home has now begun receiving donated items as word has spread.
Wolfram, who worked for 15 years as a nurse before joining elderly care management, came up with the idea when planning a “premiere night” at the home’s new cinema.
Hoping to add a little flair, Wolfram found an old East German “Troll” motor scooter on eBay to park in the lobby.
“It almost stole the show,” he said. “Suddenly the residents knew exactly where to find the brakes and the ignition, and recalled their first time taking their girlfriend out for a spin.”
Andreas Kruse, head of the gerontology institute at the University of Heidelberg in western Germany, who is not involved in the Alexa project, said its approach is based on sound research on work with dementia and Alzheimer’s patients.
However, Kruse, who has researched care for seniors who have lived in repressive states, cautioned that plunging some patients into the past risked reviving buried traumas.
“Totalitarian systems can leave their mark on people who experienced them as such well into old age,” he said.
Wolfram, who himself grew up under communism, insists he has no illusions about the regime.
“We are all happy the GDR is gone,” he said. “What we have revived instead is a feeling from a certain time in the patients’ lives that was marked by objects with which they have a positive association. Part of that is the social cohesion you had in a society where things were scarce.”
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