Materialising memories: exploring the stories of people with dementia through dress

In this article, we use clothes as a tool for exploring the life stories and narratives of people with dementia, eliciting memories through the sensory and material dimensions of dress. The article draws on an Economic and Social Research Councilfunded study, ‘Dementia and Dress’, which explored everyday experiences of clothing for carers, care workers and people with dementia, using qualitative and ethnographic methods including: ‘wardrobe interviews’, observations, and visual and sensory approaches. In our analysis, we use three dimensions of dress as a device for exploring the experiences of people with dementia: kept clothes, as a way of retaining connections to memories and identity; discarded clothes, and their implications for understanding change and loss in relation to the ‘dementia journey’; and absent clothes, invoked through the sensory imagination, recalling images of former selves, and carrying identity forward into the context of care. The article contributes to understandings of narrative, identity and dementia, drawing attention to the potential ofmaterial objects for evoking narratives, and maintaining biographical continuity for both men and women. The paper has larger implications for understandings of ageing and care practice; as well as contributing to the wider Material Turn in gerontology, showing how cultural analyses can be applied even to frail older groups who are often excluded from such approaches

Looking out of place: analysing the spatial and symbolic meanings of dementia care setting through dress

The article explores how clothing exposes – and troubles – the ambiguous location of care homes on the boundaries of public/private, home/institutional space. It deploys a material analysis of the symbolic uses and meanings of dress, extending the remit of the new cultural gerontology to encompass the “fourth age,” and the lives of older people with dementia. The article draws on an ESRC-funded study “Dementia and Dress,” conducted in the United Kingdom (UK), which explored everyday experiences of clothing for people with dementia, carers and careworkers, using ethnographic and qualitative methods. Careworkers and managers were keen to emphasise the “homely” nature of care homes, yet this was sometimes at odds with the desire to maintain presentable and orderly bodies, and with institutional routines of bodywork. Residents’ use of clothing could disrupt boundaries of public/private space, materialising a sense of not being “at home,” and a desire to return there

Identifikation von sechs potenziellen Autoantigenen bei Hunden mit dilatativer Kardiomyopathie

Die dilatative Kardiomyopathie (DCM) ist charakterisiert durch die Dilatation und beeinträchtigte Kontraktilität des linken oder beider Ventrikel. Sie ist eine der häufigsten Ursachen für ein schweres Herzversagen beim Hund. Häufig von der Erkrankung betroffene Rassen sind Dobermänner, Doggen, Bernhardiner und Irische Wolfshunde. Nur 37% der erkrankten Hunde überleben ein Jahr nach der Diagnosestellung. In vielen Fällen ist die Ätiologie der Erkrankung nicht geklärt. Bei einem Teil der DCM-Fälle scheint es sich um Autoimmunerkrankungen zu handeln. Ziel dieser Arbeit war es deshalb, die humorale Immunantwort von caninen DCM-Patienten mit Hilfe von zweidimensionalen Western Blots auf potenzielle Autoantigene zu untersuchen und diese mittels Massenspektrometrie zu identifizieren. Mit zweidimensionaler Gelelektrophorese ist es möglich, ein Gewebe in mehre tausend Proteine aufzutrennen und somit Reaktivitäten einzelnen Antigenen zuordnen zu können. Die humorale Immunreaktion von 78 DCM-Patienten und 62 herzgesunden Kontrolltieren wurde im Western Blot getestet und miteinander verglichen. Die Ergebnisse der zweidimensionalen Western Blots wurden dem Proteinmuster der eingesetzten Herzpräparationen (linkes und rechtes Atrium, linker und rechter Ventrikel) zugeordnet und die Reaktivitäten der DCM erkrankten Tiere mit herzgesunden Kontrolltieren wurden miteinander verglichen. Mit dieser Methode konnten sieben potenzielle DCM-Autoantigene ermittelt werden, die im Anschluß mittels Massenspektrometrie eindeutig identifiziert werden konnten. Dabei handelte es sich um die schwere Kette des Herzmyosins, eine regulatorische leichte Kette des Herzmyosins (MYL4), Glyceraldehyd-3-phosphat-Dehydrogenase (GAPDH), die Gehirnform der Glycogen Phosphorylase (GPBB), cardiac Actin, Aconitase und Desmin. Die Reaktion gegen sechs dieser Proteine wurde anschließend in eindimensionalen Western Blots mit den gereinigten Proteinen validiert. Nur für MYL4 stehen diese Untersuchungen noch aus. Bei der schweren Kette des Herzmyosins, GAPDH, GPBB, cardiac Actin und Aconitase wiesen die DCM-Hunde signifikant häufiger Autoantikörper auf als die Kontrolltiere. Bei einem großen Teil der DCM-Hunde ergaben sich damit Hinweise auf Autoimmunreaktionen. In dieser Studie konnten erstmals sechs potenzielle Autoantigene für die canine DCM identifiziert werden. Vier dieser Autoantigene sind auch potenzielle neue Autoantigene für die DCM des Menschen

Online @ home in retirement : Situating computer and internet use within bodies, spaces and biographies

This thesis examines how retirees make use of the Internet and computer technologies at home, as well examining the relation of these newer technologies to older Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in this sphere. It begins by reviewing previous research on older adults and Internet use, and highlighting gaps in this literature, including a lack of research on Internet use in everyday contexts, particularly the home, and a failure to situate experiences of Internet use in later life within experiences throughout the lifecourse. The importance of contextualising Internet use within `real' bodies and spaces is emphasised. Secondary data analysis was then used to examine wider patterns of Internet use among older people, and the relation Internet use in later life to living situation, lifestyle and demographic variables. Following this, the main methodology of the study involved gathering data using multiple qualitative interviews and time-use diaries, which were conducted with retirees in 17 UK households. The central argument drawn from this data is that computer and Internet use in later life need to be contextualised within the `embodied technobiographies' of individuals and cohorts. This contributes a unique perspective to discussions of age divisions, illustrating that they cannot simply be understood as the result of material and physiological changes in `old age', but as the outcome of struggles applying embodied technological competencies acquired over a lifetime to new technologies. It also has practical implications for policy makers, and illustrates the importance of practical methods of learning computing, and the importance of relating new technologies to earlier competencies and biographical interests. These findings, and the novel concept of `embodied technobiographies' developed in this thesis, also have broader implications for developing sociological theories of embodiment, technology, gender, ageing, generations and social change

Clothing, Embodied Identity, and Dementia

Clothes are central to how we perform our identities. In this article, we show how these processes continue to operate in the lives of people with dementia, exploring the ways in which dress offers a means of maintaining continuity of self at a material, embodied level. The article thus contributes to the wider cultural turn in aging studies, showing how material objects are signifcant in meaning-making, even for this mentally frail group. The article draws on the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)-funded study “Dementia and Dress,” which examined the implications of clothing for people with dementia, carers, and care workers, using ethnographic and qualitative methods. It showed, despite assumptions to the contrary, that dress remained signifcant for people with dementia, continuing to underwrite identity at both the individual level of a personal aesthetic and the social level of structural categories, such as class, gender, and generation. The article explores how identity is performed through dress in social interaction, and the tensions that can arise between narrative and embodied enactment and around the “curation” of identity. Dress provides a lens for understanding the lives of people with dementia, while at the same time, focusing on dementia expands discussions of fashion, consumption, and cultural meanings of aging

Drawing atmosphere : A case study of architectural design for care in later life

In this article, we use an entry to an international architectural student competition on future care to explore how social norms about older bodies may be challenged by designs that are sensitive to the spatial contexts within which we age. The power of the ‘My Home’ design by Witham and Wilkins derives from its hand drawn aesthetic and thus we consider the architects’ insistence on drawing as a challenge to the clear and unambiguous image making typically associated with digitally aided architectural designs. The hand drawn images of ‘My Home’ prompt a focus on care as enacted through the relations between material environments and things, and the atmospheric qualities these relations evoke. Throughout our analysis, we argue for greater attention to the ways in which embodied practices, everyday affects and materialities can be represented within architectural design, and the role of hand drawing as a creative methodology in this process

Protein expression profile of Gasterophilus intestinalis larvae causing horse gastric myiasis and characterization of horse immune reaction

Background Little information is available on the immunological aspect of parasitic Gasterophilus intestinalis (Diptera, Oestridae) larvae causing horse gastric myiasis. The objectives of this research were to analyze the protein content of larval crude extracts of the migrating second and third larvae (L2 and L3) of G. intestinalis in order to characterize the immune response of horses. Results The proteomic profile of L2 and L3, investigated by using one and two dimensional approaches, revealed a migration pattern specific to each larval stage. Furthermore, Western blots were performed with horse sera and with sera of Balb/c mice immunised with the larval crude extracts of L2 or L3, revealing a different immune reaction in naturally infected horses vs. artificially induced immune reaction in mice. The comparisons of the immunoblot profiles demonstrate that the stage L2 is more immunogenic than the stage L3 most likely as an effect of the highest enzymatic production of L2 while migrating through the host tissues. Fifteen proteins were identified by mass spectrometry. Conclusion This work provides further information into the understanding of the interaction between G. intestinalis and their host and by contributing a novel scheme of the proteomic profile of the main larval stages

Dirty linen, liminal spaces and later life: Meanings of laundry in care home design and practice

This paper explores the design and practice of laundries and laundry work in care home settings. This is an often-overlooked aspect of the care environment, yet one that shapes lived experiences and meanings of care. It draws on ethnographic and qualitative data from two UK based Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded studies: Buildings in the Making, a study of architects designing care homes for later life, and Dementia and Dress, a project exploring the role of clothing in dementia care. Drawing together these studies, the paper explores the temporality and spatiality of laundry work, contrasting designers’ conceptions of laundry in terms of flows, movement and efficiency with the lived bodily reality of laundry work, governed by the messiness of care and ‘body time’. The paper examines how laundry is embedded within the meanings and imaginaries of the care home as a ‘home’ or ‘hotel’, and exposes the limitations of these imaginaries. We explore the significance of laundry work for supporting identity, as part of wider assemblages of care. The article concludes by drawing out implications for architectural design and sociological conceptions of care

The coughing body : etiquettes, techniques, sonographies and spaces

Abstract: With newfound relevance in the context of Covid-19, we focus on the coughing body, building on an in-depth qualitative study of three UK lung infection clinics treating people with cystic fibrosis. Conceptually we take our cue from Norbert Elias and the way something as physiologically fundamental as coughing becomes the focus of etiquette and technique, touching also on themes central to Mary Douglas’ anthropology of pollution. This is explored through four themes. First, we show how coughing becomes a matter of biopolitical citizenship expressed through etiquettes that also displace pollution anxieties to surroundings. Second, coughing is a question of being assisted to cough through the mediation of professional skills, interventions and devices. Third, coughing is seen to be central to the sonographic soundscape of the healthcare environment whereby people learn to recognise (and sometimes misrecognise) each other through the ‘sound’ of the cough. Finally, coughing properly can be seen to have both a ‘time and a place’ including the retreat of the cough from public space into risky confined spaces. Our conclusion speculates on the way these insights shed light on aspects of life that, until the Covid-19 pandemic, lay largely hidden

Pathways, Practices and Architectures: Containing Anti-Microbial Resistance (AMR) in the Cystic Fibrosis Clinic

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and the adaptation of microbial life to antibiotics is recognised as a major healthcare challenge. Whereas most social science engagement with AMR has focussed on aspects of ‘behaviour’ (prescribing, antibiotic usage, patient ‘compliance’, etc), this article instead explores AMR in the context of building design and healthcare architecture, focussing on the layout, design and ritual practices of three cystic fibrosis (CF) outpatient clinics. CF is a life-threatening multi-system genetic condition, often characterised by frequent respiratory infections and antibiotic treatment. Preventing AMR and cross-infection in CF increasingly depends on the spatiotemporal isolation of both people and pathogens. Our research aims to bring to the fore the role of the built environment exploring how containment and segregation are varyingly performed in interaction with material design, focussing on three core themes. These include, first, aspects of flow, movement and the spatiotemporal choreography of CF care. Second, the management of waiting and the materiality of the waiting room is a recurrent concern in our fieldwork. Finally, we take up the question of air, the intangibility of air-borne risks and their material mitigation in the CF clinic