National Museums Liverpool operates seven museums and aims to engage people from all backgrounds through its collections. It established the House of Memories program to promote compassion in dementia care through interactive experiences at its museums. As part of this work, National Museums Liverpool created a digital memory application called My House of Memories to enable people with dementia and their families to access museum collections remotely and participate in activities together. User testing found the app was an engaging tool that supported independent use and social interaction for memory recollection.

2. National Museums Liverpool
Presentation by: Carol Rogers
Executive Director Education and Visitors
National Museums Liverpool

3. Who we are
• Founded in 1851
• Established as a national museum in 1986
• The only national museum in England outside
London
• Seven iconic venues
• Museum service for Liverpool and Merseyside
• The region’s largest cultural organisation
• National responsibility
• International remit

4. National Museums Liverpool

5. Our Mission
We change lives and enable
millions of people from all
backgrounds, to engage with our
world‐class museums.

7. The House of Memories promotes
the need and value for
compassion, respect and dignity in
care to achieve better health and
wellbeing, and support for people
living with dementia

8. The approach is the first of its kind
in the UK enabling museums,
health care and housing providers
to work together to deliver an
imaginative and accessible ‘whole
community’ dementia awareness
experience.

10. Dementia in the United Kingdom
•Over 800,000 people in UK
diagnosed with dementia
•Financial cost of dementia to
UK is over £23 billion
•Only 40% of people with
dementia receive an early
diagnosis
•In less than ten years the
number of people with
dementia in UK will reach
1 million

11. House of Memories
•To date more than 5,000
participants in Liverpool,
Bury, Salford, Sunderland,
Newcastle, Birmingham,
Leicester and Nottingham
•Externally funded by Dept of
Health and local health and
social housing partners.
•Content designed to enable
greater understanding of the
value of a person’s history
and life experience
•Activities include an
interactive training day and
new resources for settings

12. The Memory Toolkit

13. A Bespoke Museum Guide

14. The Memory Tree

15. The Memory Suitcase

16. Key Outcomes for Participants
•Confident to try new
approaches with those their
care for.
•Demonstrable shift in their
cognitive and emotional
understanding of dementia and
its implications for those
effected.
•Enhanced capacity to assess
their own attitudes and
performance to cultivate an
appropriate care relationship.
•Majority believed that their
knowledge, skills and access to
resources to carry out memory
activities in settings had
increased significantly

17. “Its about caring for them and the
life they once had, as well as caring
for the condition and the effect it has
on them”
Participant 2013

18. “The House of Memories is an exceptional
project…. It is fantastic that the cultural
sector is involved in work on dementia; it is
a great collaboration. . . The work is
critically important in supporting our drive to
create more dementia-friendly
communities.”
Norman Lamb MP: Minister of State for
Care and Support 2013

19. My House of Memories 2014
A digitised memory app for people with
dementia, their families and carers.

20. The Value
• To create a legacy for
House of Memories
• To support older
people’s access to
new technology
• To tackle social
isolation with aging
communities

21. Who is it for?
• People living with dementia
• Carers and families
• Isolated older people
• Networks supporting older
people

22. The Commissioning Process
• Core aim to produce
a dementia friendly
product
• Creation of an
innovative and
inclusive design brief
• Appointment of
external digital design
agency

23. User Led Design
• Co designed with people
living with dementia and
their carers
• Collaboration with
Innovate Dementia
(Liverpool John Moores
University)
• Partnership with Mersey
Care NHS Trust - Mossley
Hill Memory Group

24. My House of Memories
• Includes hundreds of inspirational ‘living
history’ museum objects.
• Multi-sensory experience: music, sound
effects and videos
• Easy to use design - touch screen
controls
• Activities to do together
• A ‘read aloud’ option for people who
prefer to listen
• A toolkit for carers with additional
memory activities

25. Digital Content
• 112 Museum Objects
• 328 Images
• 27 Background Music Themes
• 22 Background Sound Effects
• 23 Movies (6 for social care training)

26. Stripped back design

27. Choice of activity

28. Personalisation

29. Intuitive design

30. Audio captions / large text

31. Subtitles

32. Carers toolkit

33. How do we think it will be used?
• With families including
younger children
• Day centres
• Residential care
settings
• Sheltered
accommodation
• Hospitals and day
wards

34. FILM
My House of Memories 2014

35. User Analysis
UK launch 22 May 2014
• 260 Downloads
• 272 Users
• 197 iOs
• 72 Android
• 918 Sessions: 252 UK, 15 USA,
1 Cyprus, 1 Japan
(29% new, 71% returning users)

36. User Analysis
What did they do on the app?
• 321 Created a profile
• 337 Activities
• 272 Browsers
• 159 Played videos
• 113 Searched options
• 34 Donation clicks

37. User Analysis
Most popular screens:
• 937 About the app
• 717 Object browser
• 301 Carers toolkit
• 254 Memory tree
• 207 Memory box
• 178 Working with people’s memories
Most popular objects…….

38. How will we circulate and market?
• House of Commons
launch (2014)
• Regular older people
museum celebration
events
• House of Memories
membership
programme

39. Future Developments
•Integrate House of Memories
into mainstream health strategy
and policy making
•Increase funding for House of
Memories
•Donate campaign for My House
of Memories
•Explore European museum
partnership
•AND new activities for people
living with dementia and older
people
Meet me at the Museum,
When I Was Little and Happy
Older People