Karen Shearsmith-Farthing

Providing the Right Therapy | Karen Shearsmith-Farthing

Music in Mind is currently a pilot programme which is running for ten weeks in the North West. Manchester University is backing the project which is aiming to help as many people as possible living with dementia in nursing homes throughout the area by seeing if classical music can relieve anxiety and develop communication skills. Care for people with mental health problems is a serious issue in the UK, and as the population gets older, the current value of 800,000 people diagnosed with dementia is only going to rise further.

Karen Shearsmith-Farthing has spent her career caring for people with a range of complex and co-morbid physical and mental health problems. Part of the services she provides are akin with what Music in Mind is trying to achieve, to rehabilitate individuals with dementia as easily as possible reducing the cost to the NHS and discomfort to the patients. The bespoke services which Karen Shearsmith-Farthing provides are catered to each individual, in order to make their care as meaningful & effective as possible. By assessing their mental health, Karen Shearsmith-Farthing can then devise a plan which will coordinate care services even if the individual is admitted to a general healthcare setting.

After the first few sessions of Music in Mind, carers immediately noticed a response with less agitation and even better posture from some residents. It is clear that this alternative form of therapy is having the right effect on those who have participated so far and it is important that they receive the right therapy for their condition.

In 2012, the Centre for Mental Health wrote a report on how people were being treated with regards to their mental illness while admitted to a general healthcare institute. It is difficult for those not properly trained to treat somebody with dementia for instance if they are admitted for a physical illness. Unfortunately, with dementia in particular, the Centre for Mental Health found that ineffective treatment was resulting in longer admissions and more frequent visits to the hospital. An eighth of all money spent treating long term conditions by the NHS was a result of mental health. This expense could be partially saved if those people were receiving the right treatment and thus released earlier from hospital.

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