Munch Fourteen - (Week 3) Roleplay and References

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During the class, the lecturers asked us to look through our previous mind map and we need to find a way to empathise. Empathise to what? In our group case, we need to empathise with the old people. How? By role-playing.

We decided to role play as the old people. I was an old lady with hearing loss and sight problems, Saumyaa was playing as the caretaker, and Moose was playing as a depressed old man.

I think we succeed in entertaining the audience, and we actually manage to show them how hard living as a we grow old. By empathising to the victims, which in this case is the senior citizens, we manage to understand more about their problems, which hopefully will help us finding the right solutions in solving their safety problems.

After that, we were given a task to research about our topic, Safety for Old People in House, and gain information from books, magazines, and websites. 

Here are some information I got.

I learnt from Rospa that the most common problem senior citizens encounter in their house is fall. Although most falls do not result in a serious injury, being unable to get up exposes the faller to the risk of hypothermia and pressure sores. There are some factor that influence the risk, some of them are physical ability and lack of mobility, balance and gait disorders, and nutritional status -­ vitamin D and calcium deficiency.

I also got some tips from HealthAging.org and A Housing Safety Checklist made by Sarah D. Kirby, such as:

• Emergency numbers and your address are posted by each telephone. 
• Telephones are located in each room. They can be reached from the floor in case of a fall.
• Bathroom flooring is matte-finished, textured tile, or low pile commercial carpet (no throw rugs or bathmats).
• Place grab bars in the shower to make getting in and out of the bathtub easier and safer. Put grab bars near the toilet.

There are more information I got from other sites and books which I will include in the research report.