How can music and technology help people with dementia?

How can a playlist of personally meaningful music help people with dementia to feel more like themselves and connected to others? What technologies can help them remain socially connected and get out and about in the community?

These are some of the questions which will be explored at this event hosted by The Open University in Scotland: How can music and technology help people with dementia stay socially connected?

This public talk is for anyone with an interest in dementia and caring for people with dementia.

Keynote speaker Sally Magnusson (pictured right), Open University Honorary Graduate, journalist, broadcaster and writer, will focus on the role of music in dementia care.

Sally will talk about the need to move research away from purely biomedical solutions - important as they are - towards interventions to make the lives of people living with dementia easier, and to make the most of their potential that still exists.

She will illustrate this with experiences of caring for her mother and the results of the Playlist for Life charity she founded in 2013, which encourages families and carers of people with dementia to provide them with a playlist of personally meaningful music on an iPod, with one of the many benefits being maintaining family and wider connections.

Sally will be joined by Dr Caroline Holland, Senior Research Fellow in the School of Health, Wellbeing and Social Care at The Open University.

Caroline will discuss using technologies to enable people with dementia to maintain or improve their social connectedness, both online and offline, such as using Global Positioning Systems (GPS) and other technologies, to get out and about in the community.

The free event will be chaired by Susan Stewart, Director of The Open University in Scotland.

Book your place in advance here.