Kindling: A Case Study for Communicating with Family Members Battling Alzheimer’s

Jada Gibson

Published in

TylerGAID

8 min readApr 23, 2020

Kindling is a card game and app set that helps families communicate with their loved ones suffering from Alzheimer’s.

Intro

When my grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2017 my family’s world turned upside down. Life became a whirlwind of doctor’s appointments and before we knew it my grandmother’s memories had deteriorated. Memories of old conversations and time spent with her now seem like pieces from a distant past.

Due to the stress and pressure from caring for my grandmother, family traditions fell through the cracks, and her life began to revolve around appointments. This problem seems to be one that occurs in many families. So how can family’s continue to bond after such life-altering news?

Research

Alzheimer’s affects an estimated 4 million adults in the United States. Experts have found that keeping the brain stimulated helps slow the progression of Alzheimer’s Disease. One form of therapy caregivers have turned to is Reminiscence Therapy. Due to the fact that short term memory is lost before the deterioration of long term memory, reminiscence therapy helps calm patients by allowing them to participate in conversations about the past. This form of therapy is guided by a “caretaker,” who initiates the conversation by mentioning an old household item or a personal event from the individual’s life. Centering questions around these specific topics helps trigger memories and spark conversations. Although it has many benefits the therapy is not risk-free. Patients may grow frustrated when you start to reminisce with them because they might not remember things as clearly.

After reading journals and articles highlighting the benefits of Reminiscence Therapy I decided to look into how caregivers and therapists are implementing the exercises. Are the questions unique to each patient? Is there a general template all facilities relay on? After a few searches, I found that it’s a little bit of both. Some nursing homes and care centers collect information to create “life portraits” of the patient and tailor their Reminiscence Therapy experience. Other facilities relay on Reminiscence Cards, these are a bit more general.

In order to figure out a middle ground between the two practices I began analyzing the different types of Reminiscence therapy cards. The first I found was from the company Active Minds. These cards included 15 images stretching from the 1950s to the 1970s with questions set at a medium difficulty level to allow them to be used during any stage of Alzheimer’s—but more ideal for the mid-stage. The questions on the back of the cards revolve around general topics such as things in the home and connect them to the images on the front. While these cards are relatively general, they’re still distinct. The images and questions target a specific socioeconomic audience.

The next product I reviewed was a conversation card set sold on Amazon. These cards came in multiple decks and each deck catered to different interests. The front of the card had an image on it (for example, if the topic was chocolate the image would be a chocolate bar) and the back a series of questions ranging from personal ones to fact-based ones. I liked that these cards were more general, but they felt impersonal. It was more like playing 21 questions rather than taking a walk down memory lane.

The third company I found was called Maternally Reminiscence Therapy. This company sells Reminiscence Therapy cards and activity sets. The photos are more modern when compared to the Active Minds’ set but they still have a nostalgic feel. These sets can be ordered based on the topic, for example, a set focused on camping. The questions on the back are formatted in multiple-choice, which could help ease frustrations for patients who struggle to remember how to word something or what something is called. It gives them options instead of forcing them to materialize a response. While this set is more personal for users based on their interests, it limits them to just one interest and it could grow costly for families to purchase multiple sets.

Solution

Each of the card sets I found has its own positive point, but each also lacks an element that could help unify families. When coming up with a concept for my thesis I knew I wanted to design a brand that could help families through this stressful time while helping the diagnosed love one. Researching the cards is when I came up with the idea for Kindling.

Kindling is a card game, app, and journal set designed to help you communicate with loved once facing mild to moderate Alzheimer’s Disease. The cards use a series of questions to help spark conversation and pair with an app that allows families to record and document their new memories. After spending quality time together and enjoying conversation, you can replay your sessions or watch sessions other family members have done. Once the entire card set has been completed you can order a printed version of the sessions translated to a journal for yourself and copies to share with the rest of the family.

Name and Logo Development

When it came to creating a name for this project I thought about my main purpose. I knew I wanted this to be something that focused on generating new memories while promoting togetherness, confidence, open dialogue, and storytelling. The name Kindling represents all of these things. Kindling can be an awakening, it can mean excitement, or the spark of a fire (which for some can serve as a reminder of FDR’s fireside chats).

In developing the logo I wanted to incorporate the old adage of tying a string around your finger to remember something. My main challenge was figuring out how literal the string needed to be. Would a script typeface look more string-like? Did it need to be tied to something? After exploring multiple variations I landed on the final design. Instead of having the word Kindling be the string, I set the name in a serif font and looped string through the letterforms, tying them together.

Branding

Based on my research I began developing Kindling as a brand. When picking colors I did research on which were beneficial to Alzheimer’s patients. The research revealed that color contrast is important and helps draw attention to key features. Researchers have also found red, blue, and green to be preferred colors for Alzheimer’s patients. This is because the color red increases brainwave activity and catches an individual’s attention. Blue is known for being restful and calming, it helps to lower blood pressure. Green is symbolic of growth and life, it’s also a restful color, and reduces central nervous system activity.

The typefaces used throughout the brand were Kopius and Brandon Grotesque. Kopius is the serif typeface used in the logo and as titles on the cards. I chose this serif because it’s balanced. While the typeface is a bold serif, it has a gentle organic flow. This helps communicate the brand’s personality, it grabs users’ attention but supports and nurtures them through their experience. The primary typeface is Brandon Grotesque, a sans serif. Through its understated and clean appearance, this typeface communicates the simplicity and organization of the brand.

User Personas

In order to fully understand the wide audience I was designing for, I created some user personas. As a result of the user personas, I was able to make design choices that supported individual needs while still catering to a large group.