The shaping of a dementia-friendly cinema

There is an increased focus on the challenges of including people with dementia in everyday life, which in Britain for instance can be seen in The Prime Minister’s challenge, supported by the Alzheimer’s Society, of creating dementia friendly communities. The vision is to tackle exclusion that people living with dementia experience; and yet, what actually constitutes a dementia friendly community is still difficult to determine. In this poster, we explore what makes a public space dementia friendly. We draw on qualitative research from a follow-on evaluation of a dementia friendly cinema pilot within the North East of England to report results from this scheme. Part of this was to explore, and devise an effective method, of gathering feedback from people with dementia and their carers. We introduced ‘ThoughtCloud’, a digital feedback tool for events, inviting cinema goers to express their thoughts and feelings about the scheme. The motivation of the design was to enable people with disabilities to provide feedback about care services, and this was the first time it was used with a group of people with dementia. The main strength of using ThoughCloud was in capturing ‘snippets’ of feedback straight after the films were shown. Key findings highlight how although the physical aspects of the cinema were important, the ambience and role of staff in meeting care needs were also seen as crucial to the success of the scheme.