“There is insufficient care for people with Alzheimer’s disease in the Czech Republic. We do not have secure places or specifically trained staff, explains Martina Polanská, director of the Social Services Center and the EHPAD Máchova in Prague 2. We have to take cognitive disorders into account in the creation of our future facilities. "Faced with this observation, the city of Prague has therefore decided that its new structure, which is scheduled to open in 2024, must take these pathologies into account.
The Czech and French health models are not that different: social security, public funding, daily prices… the basic elements are comparable. It is rather on the innovative functioning of the Village that the delegation came to peck ideas: what security for residents? which professional team to support them?
The delegation also wanted to find out about the types of care implemented here, as they largely use psycho-biography (based on a very good knowledge of the patient's previous life, including the construction of reminiscence rooms) in Czech Republic. The first positive feedback on the Village’s non-drug methods made the visitors optimistic.
Comparing Czech and Landes models
The discovery of the different areas of the Village then led to a systematic comparison of the methods used in each country. Whether it concerns technical aspects such as the use of watches with a call button in Prague for distress situations versus the installation in strategic locations of sound-activated intercoms in Dax… Or whether it is about the participation of volunteers: for Martina Polanská and her colleagues, it will be more difficult in the Czech Republic where volunteering is less common.
In architectural terms, the Prague establishment planned to be located in the city center of the capital will not be able to offer a landscaped park on the same scale as in the village. But the issue of exteriors and the walking needs of people with Alzheimer's disease were still taken into account by the designers.
“We are really delighted with this visit. It confirms that we are going in the right direction,” concluded the future headmistress of the Czech establishment. The project will come to its fruition in two to three years from now in the heart of Prague.
