About Uplifting Dementia
Dementia may challenge us all, because of the fundamental complexity of the condition, however it is time we regain our focus, first and foremost, and behold life through the lens of the person living with dementia.
Moreover, the deficiency in basic support and provision of advice to those who either live with the condition, and/or their care partners, is an ongoing issue.
As care partners, it is our responsibility to continue, provide and deliver lifestyles that value each person’s uniqueness, whilst shaping narratives that uphold equality, diversity, and inclusivity.
By affirming the life transitions of another, interacting on a human level, connecting with benevolence, and acknowledging emotional desires, we may effectively endorse social understanding, intimacy, comfort, and amiability, thus enrich lives, maintain emotional engagement, and uphold capability based, holistic sustainable solutions.
Once we develop abilities that share somebody’s vantage point, vibe off what they feel, and experience their subsistence with them, we may organically begin to grasp the abundance of possibilities open to us, beautify lives, convert ill-being to wellbeing, and subsequently preserve self-image, self-worth and purpose.
This highly developed perspective essentially provides a more empathetically unified voice upholding individual autonomy, and campaigning for the human rights of all people living with dementia, demonstrating a valuable way forward in the provision of person-centred, deferential, dementia support.
Our Mission
To deliver and influence supportive, dynamic and quality guidance, contributing to a compassionate, inclusive and dignified future for older people and people living with dementia.
Our Vision
To create a profound and transformative difference by inspiring changed perspectives, through reconceptualising dementia, endorsing sensitive vantage points that uphold respect and empathy, thus empowering people living with dementia, and their family and friends, to live their best lives.
To enrich lives based on recognition of self, maintaining personhood and purpose, whilst demonstrating how continuation of shared experiences upholds human connection, in a manner that is personally significant.
To value and celebrate each person’s uniqueness, shaping inspirational reverential and meaningful life experiences, thus upholding dignity, and equality, whilst advocating for the human rights of all people living with dementia.
Goals and Objectives:
Uplifting Dementia operates under a strong ethos of integrity, sincerity, compassion, empathy, curiosity, and excellence, and believes the only way to make a difference is through the development of robust partnerships that generate exceptional and responsive attitudes to dementia support.
Uplifting Dementias goals are underpinned by a philosophy that recognises dementia does not define who a person is, nor alter the elemental necessity to continue relationships with others, and to feel appreciated and ‘affirmed’ as a complete being within this current moment.
Advocating a solution, and providing a supportive community, may be the catalyst to people living with dementia, and care partners developing together, fresh compelling “norms” that celebrate positive ageing and wellbeing.
About Leah
Leah Bisiani is a highly skilled Registered Nurse Division 1/MHlthSc/DipBus/Dementia and Aged Care consultant, with more than 35 years’ experience in aged /dementia care.
Self-development has been a priority, and Leah has simultaneously undertaken and completed considerable qualifications and management/corporate employment within the aged care industry, establishing a knowledge and experience base placing her at the forefront of the industry.
Leah has a passionate dedication towards Best Practice and consistently utilizes her progressive approaches to obtain the highest possible quality of life for people living with dementia.
Her work aims at redefining and rethinking dementia, whilst embracing a more expansive view of the person who lives with a diagnosis of dementia, through the provision of care based on remaining assets, rehabilitative support for acquired cognitive disabilities, and a unified voice of advocacy that upholds individual autonomy. This, her primary area of expertise, has focused on excellence, and enabling models of care that are responsive to the specific needs of people living with dementia.
Leah has successfully demonstrated how reconsidering the medical paradigm and creating environments in which persons living with dementia continue to thrive, facilitates continuation of life based on recognition of self, and the valuing of individual uniqueness.
Leah won both the 2010/11 Lend Lease ‘Australian’, and ‘Global’, Award for “Excellence in Innovation” for her person-centred models of care, designed for people living with dementia within residential aged care. These awards recognised Leah’s contribution to the aged care sector and specifically to the lives of those living with dementia.
Leah distributes and publishes her evidence-based studies, and papers, within the medical field, aged care sector and community, and in 2011, her thesis, “Doll therapy: A therapeutic means to meet past attachment needs – a case study approach”, was published by Sage Publications. She now continues to write key documents and articles for significant dementia journals and various medical organisations/websites globally.
Leah’s ground-breaking and highly effective work, and increased profile, has inevitably resulted in numerous, ongoing invitations over the years to lecture at leading national and global conferences.
As her proficiency expanded and her reputation as an innovator was acknowledged, Leah commenced working predominantly in consulting, clinical advisory, research, education/learning, and development.
Having now developed herself as a leader in the field, Leah strives to continue inspiring aged care services and local communities to create meaningful, shared experiences that transform dementia understanding and expand compassion.
Leah’s life’s work and vision effectually transforms cultures and philosophies of care, providing a powerful voice that confronts current practice, forges an approach that removes all forms of segregation by acknowledging everyone has the right to “Freedom of Expression”, and consequently upholds the human rights of all people living with dementia.
Her pioneering revelations have enabled people living with dementia to attain maximised and enriched lifestyles, and furthermore, successfully empowered, and motivated humanity to embrace her dreams of change.
As per the words of Ghandi, Leah believes: “Be the Change You Want to See in the World”.
“Evidently, we are accountable for nurturing our own humanity to support civilisation, and value the cultivation of kindness, by respecting our vulnerable older population, and especially people living with dementia.
We must acquire the ability to develop compassion, we should critique isolation and reintroduce community and culture changes, subsequently refining our great power and precision in response to a more humane philosophy.
Reach out and be proud to advocate and provide a voice of strength for the empathy revolution”.
– Leah Bisiani