Chestnut Knoll Employee Receives Special Dementia Certification

According to the Alzheimer’s Association, 5.7 million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s disease. With no known cure, this number is only expected to increase, which is why providing innovative care support is extremely important.

Chestnut Knoll Personal Care and Memory Care and its management group, Heritage Senior Living LLC, are always looking to improve their residents’ quality of life, especially, for residents in need of memory care.

Jennelle Jamison, director of staff development and resident care at Chestnut Knoll, has received her Trainer Certification in Teepa Snow’s Positive Approach™ to Care. As a trainer, she will train others in the PAC philosophy, providing dementia-related awareness, knowledge and skill development in a classroom, community or support group setting.

“Chestnut Knoll is a proud leader in providing high-quality care to seniors, especially through our signature dementia program. We continuously strive to improve our services through understanding our industry’s best practices and approaches, such as those found in Teepa Snow’s PAC philosophy,” said Shawn Barndt, executive director at Chestnut Knoll. “I’m extremely proud of Jennelle’s accomplishment in becoming a PAC-certified trainer and look forward to her enhancing the knowledge and skills of our staff as we continue to raise the level of service provided to our residents and further solidify our expertise within the community!”

Teepa Snow is one of America’s leading educators on dementia, and her philosophy is reflective of her diverse education, work experience, medical research, and firsthand caregiving interactions. Teepa Snow and her team believe “Until There’s a Cure, There’s Care,” and it’s their mission to help families and professionals better understand how it feels to be living with dementia and related challenges.

Given Snow’s highly regarded reputation and innovative teaching techniques, it’s no wonder that Heritage Senior Living was eager to fully adopt the PAC philosophy. Jamison’s certification allows her to educate all HSL staff members within the 13 senior housing communities located throughout the Mid-Atlantic region, including Chestnut Knoll. She will help staff members to develop their skills and prepare them to step into the world of a person living with dementia. This teaching technique allows staff members to see the person for who they were and still are, instead of what they have lost to the disease.

“Heritage Senior Living is excited to have a PAC-certified trainer as part of our team. In her position at Chestnut Knoll, Jennelle is both a resource and an advocate for residents with dementia and their families. Her certification will now allow her to share her expertise with all the HSL communities, and residents in every memory care neighborhood will benefit from this caring approach,” said Gretchen Vakiener, vice president of Sales and Marketing. “We have beautifully designed neighborhoods and a proven activity-based format, so embracing a training program that is so resident- and care-focused, guarantees that we are offering the best possible care for residents with memory loss.”

Jamison went through online video training, precourse work featuring Teepa Snow, two-day onsite classroom workshop in Cary, North Carolina, and posttraining follow-up with a PAC Mentor to grow workshop facilitation skills.

“Changing our approach and how we interact with a person living with dementia can have a huge impact on their quality of life,” said Jamison. “Learning to focus on the abilities of this person instead of what they have lost is very important. This disease is life-changing, not only for the person living with the diagnosis but for families and friends around them.”

For more information about the Teepa Snow Positive Approach™ to Care and the certification she received, visit http://teepasnow.com.