Senior Patients Care For Kittens — Helping Their Memories To Come Back

Aug 07, 2019 by apost team

A pilot program is underway at the Catalina Springs Memory Care Center. The center, located in Oro Valley, Arizona, is home to residents who are dealing with different types of memory loss. However, many are seeing improvement after participating in the program.

Seniors at the care center are being partnered up with foster kittens. Rebecca Hamilton, the woman in charge of this fascinating new program, brings in kittens and matches them up with elderly patients. The patients are then tasked with caring and bottle feeding the foster kittens during the day.

Hamilton stated to ABC News that she came up with this plan after fostering a number of kittens herself. The local animal care facility, Pima Animal Care Center, was always looking for volunteers who could foster baby kittens. Since many of the kittens were still newborns, they needed to be fed on a strict schedule. It was hard to find people who could commit to the task.

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Hamilton quickly realized that the kittens and patients would both benefit from the situation. She came up with the name “Bottle Babies” and put her plan to work. The pilot program brings the newborn kittens into the center to be cared for by the many elderly patients who live there.

According to some studies, such as one titled "Elderly people in many respects benefit from interaction with dogs", being in charge of a pet allow seniors to feel useful. It may benefit seniors in many ways: an overview of several studies suggests pets help with depression, cardiovascular health, and anxiety. Having a kitten to take care can potentially reduce feelings of loneliness and depression, as this 2006 study suggests. 

According to another study published in the Activities, Adaption & Aging Journal in 2008, it can also lower stress levels and lead to more satisfaction for participants.

The Bottle Babies program has been going strong since 2016. It has also been an amazing success. The kittens are in their most vulnerable state and need humans who can dedicate the time and attention they need to get healthy. The elderly patients have that time and are thrilled to offer their services. Hamilton stated that the seniors simply light up when someone places a kitten in their hands.

She even stated that many of the elderly patients started to remember the animals they owned when they were children. Holding and caring for the kittens often brings back memories that they had forgotten. The program is a win-win for all involved.

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