Design for Dementia - Helen Hamlyn Centre - Royal College of Art

DESIGN FOR FOR DEMENTIA
DINING
TABLEWARE
The eating skills of residents in the mid to
late stages of dementia can be improved and
maintained through the use of appropriately
designed tableware. This section highlights
key features needed to improve the experience
of meal times. An entire range of tableware is
proposed here, designed to meet the varying
abilities of people who find it challenging
to eat due to dementia or reduced physical
ability. Key areas of focus include reduction
in visual acuity and dexterity.
To examine which features appealed to
residents and best supported their needs, an
audit of existing products was used as a tool
to discuss current solutions on the market.
Care staff and residents all agreed assistive
tableware was often childish in appearance
and not age appropriate. Materials such as
plastics were less desirable because of their
cheap tactile quality and intrinsic colour
schemes and that were either bright and
childish, or beige, associated with assistive
technology therefore becoming stigmatising.
Products also appeared to be illconsidered
for the care home setting and
included basic failings that made them less
functional and appealing. Problems included
an inability to stack, materials that aged badly
and the use of colours, particularly in plates,
that made the food look unappealing.
From research conducted in a variety
of care homes it became clear that assistive
tableware was often not stocked despite the
fact that residents could have benefitted
from them. Some managers opted not to
include them in their kitchens because of the
lack of aesthetic appeal. It was felt that they
detracted from the quality of the meal.
Current assistive tableware stood out
from other pieces at the table and added a
sense of stigma to the people using them. Care
facilities have residents of diverse abilities
and those residents who had to use assistive
table settings felt different from the residents
who could use standard tableware.
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The design of this new range of tableware sets
out to achieve a number of goals.
It aims to:
Highlight specific features that could benefit
older people in care.
Provide commercially viable solutions that
were durable and that could be permanently
stocked in care homes.
Create a range that matched as a set and
formed a complete table setting so that
people were not singled out by the objects
they had to use.
Ensure that solutions maintained a resemblance
to domestic tableware so that plates
looked like plates and cups which looked like
cups. This was essential to ensure that the
function of the objects remained clear and
obvious for people at the more advanced
stages of dementia.
Tablesetting in existing care home
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