Our therapeutic gardening groups usually take place weekly or fortnightly, last for an hour and are led by one of our trained staff.
The UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) recommends that care plans should address activities of daily living that maximise independent activity, adapt and enhance function, and minimize need for support. The garden and the activity of gardening provides a non-pharmacological approach to address these goals and horticultural therapy can be utilized to improve the quality of life for the aging population and yielded high level patient/ carer satisfaction, possibly reducing costs of long-term, assisted living and dementia unit residents.
A number of studies have shown the benefits of therapeutic gardens and horticultural activities for patients with dementia. Studies have reported benefits of horticultural therapy and garden settings in reduction of pain, improvement in attention, lessening of stress, modulation of agitation, lowering of as need medications, and antipsychotics and reduction in falls.
