About MUKES

 

 

The Finnish Centre for Cultural Diversity and Memory`s aim is to secure that people from ethnic minority backgrounds with dementia get a timely and accurate diagnosis.

 

The Finnish Centre for Cultural Diversity and Memory - MUKES supports social- and healthcare professionals and students by raising awareness of cultural sensitive memory work. We also raise the awareness of the elderly from ethnic minorities, about brain health, memory disorders, and dementia. Our primary goal and focus are to continue to support the elderly from different language and cultural minorities and create a memory center that best suits their needs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MUKES webinar 2024

Webinar "50 Shades of Memory Work" is rescheduled:
Thursday, November 21, 2024, from 12 pm - 3 pm UTC+2 (Helsinki Time)

Save the Date!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jututtaja-project 2023–2025

 

Jututtaja -project is Finland’s first new type of phone support project, offering telephone services for seniors in different languages. 

 

In connection with the corona pandemic, the Multicultural Elderly Work Association conducted a survey of elderly people with different languages . It was found that the elderly suffer from a lack of knowledge, anxiety, memory disorders, loneliness, lack of motivation, inactivity and fears for their loved ones. So far, a lot of work has already been done by different parties, but a lot still needs to be done in order to figure out how to deal with a foreign language speaking elderly person, based on his/her own needs.

Based on the above mentioned findings, a new idea/approach was born in which a controlled telephone service. Calling the elderly is not a new invention in itself, as many organizations already offer conversational help, guidance and counseling. However, what makes the Jututtaja project different is that the project offers a culturally specific, native-language guided telephone service. In the service, the volunteer's own well-being is as important as the recipient of the call, i.e. the elderly . The project is based on the operating model of the network of Estonian memory trainers, which has received good research results and has also successfully spread internationally.

We have a great dream that at the end of the Jututtaja project we will have:  
-A comprehensive operating model and training materials in different languages will ​​have been created. 
-The satisfaction level of the elderly people we have trained and participated in the projects is at least in the top ten.
-We will have reached out to lonely elderly people and that the volunteers have experienced some form of joy in their lives. We also dream that new information will have been gained by the volunteers and they will be able to maintain their own well-being, brain and memory health.  
-The project will have proved everyone's experience and we have the opportunity to implement the activities nationwide. 
-Professionals receive new tools for meeting elderly people who speak different languages, and we have numerous good partners from Helsinki to Sodankyla. 
-Our dream is to also have Jututtaja activities throughout Finland for the joy of aging people with different languages ​​and volunteers.

 

Please click here to view and download our brochures in PDF format:

Become a volunteer! and Phone support for seniors living at home who belong to different language and cultural groups!

 

 

MUKES-NEWS

 

The Finnish Centre for Cultural Diversity and Memory - MUKES has developed a platform for presenting multicultural memory work in Finland and elsewhere - The MUKES-news

This new digital magazine is an information package intended for professionals in the field of elderly migrants and memory work with ethnic minorities. The MUKES-news will be published 1-2 times a year.

The MUKES-news conveys current themes of multicultural memory work, intercultural elderly care, development projects, and research from both, Finland and the rest of the world.
All articles are translated either partially, or completely from Finnish to English or otherwise. 

Follow the news on our Facebook page MUKES - Kulttuurinen Moninaisuus -Muistikeskus

You can click and read the magazine eighter open scale on a computer or side-wise on a tablet/ phone.

Check out our newest magazine MUKES-news 2/ 2023 here:

You can click and read the magazine eighter open scale on a computer or side-wise on a tablet/ phone.

Check out our magazine MUKES-news 1/ 2023 here:

Check out our first magazine MUKES-news 1/ 2022 here:

 

 

 

Please, feel free to share the MUKES-news with everyone.

 

MUKES development projects

 

2022 "The many faces of multicultural memory work” - video project

                                                                                                

    Click here to watch the MUKES video:   ►               "The many faces of multicultural memory work"

The Finnish Centre for Cultural Diversity and Memory published a video as a new tool at the end of 2022 "The many faces of multicultural memory work", which is aimed at future social security services development.

This video shows the views of different parties of memory work - looking at it from the perspective of a doctor, a person suffering from memory problems, a loved one, and a memory care provider. Although the video does not offer answers, it presents how linguistic and cultural minorities suffer from memory problems and how affected persons can survive in the current service system.
The video raises questions from the perspectives of both service users and providers: Are language skills enough? language and health literacy of clients belonging to cultural minorities in the service system for understanding and understanding memory disorders? What about whether the memory industry service providers have enough tools and know-how to meet linguistic and cultural minorities without losing their own professionalism?

The MUKES video was edited in English in 2023.

On February 2023 MUKES organized a discussion event, based on the video. The event discussed issues related to high-quality memory work and the right of all people to that - Everyone has the right to high-quality memory work. The quality of the services was examined with an emphasis on the human rights perspective because those needed by minorities services are also a human rights issue. Everyone has the right to receive treatment and help in a way that they understand the course and meaning of the treatment process as well as possible, and that he will be treated as himself.
We discussed with experts in the field how memory work should be developed so that the services offered would correspond to the needs and starting points of persons belonging to linguistic and cultural minorities. We pondered, what kind of understanding and know-how is needed for the quality of memory work done with minorities to improve.

Highlighted cultural otherness
The event was opened by University of Helsinki docent Anna-Leena Riitaoja by reflecting on the prevailing conditions, perceptions and practices that produce cultural otherness. The Finnish service system as a part the Nordic welfare model is by default universal, i.e. serving everyone. However, the services are built on the idea of ​​a nation-state, making them suitable for certain types of people. As a result, those who swim like fish in water", are privileged to use services produced with public funds. "Norm's outsiders" come into contact with the structures and are ignored or excluded from the services. This leads to the fact that people seen as different are subject to change in the structures of the services instead of changing.
When users of the services are limited to certain types, they are divided into two groups: primary and secondary. The first ones include those who are, as it were, a priority and are considered the self-evident choice as users of the services. Those thought of as “others” are different and deviant, so their starting point and their needs are often ignored. This diminishes the value of people who are thought of as “others” and they are brought down “outside” to be managed by special services or organizations. In a diverse society, this kind of thing thinking is not sustainable from the point of view of social inclusion.
One argument for producing otherness is the appeal to cultural differences. Cultural differences overemphasizing instead of commonalities leads to the loss of common humanity. Equal need to use the services then remain unrecognized and the customer's goals begin to be set as their own based on interpretations. Those designated as culturally different are also often viewed "through one lens" and interpretations are often accompanied by negative preconceptions. The challenges faced by the customer are easily interpreted by cultural differences rather than the system. Frustration and criticism arising from the rigidity of the system are silenced by appealing to cultural differences.

From interpreting fears and inability to act as different
When we interpret those belonging to linguistic and cultural minorities as different, we often don't know how to speak up about sensitive topics. The situation may be related to the fear of hurting the elderly or causing a misunderstanding. However, avoiding public speaking does not serve the client, the professional, or society.
Elderly people who speak a foreign language have the right to receive information in an understandable way and in such a way that they also understand the service package and criteria for granting. If this is not received, we cannot assume that the elderly or their relatives know how to act in the right way in the service system or understand service paths.
Knowing how to do memory work with linguistic and cultural minorities also means paying attention to interpreter work. An interpreter's job is challenging in a situation where age, memory illness, and other factors combine interpretations of health. If the interpreter leaves something unsaid, explains more than the client spoke, or cannot verbalize difficult, taboo-related things, there is a risk that a memory work professional will not be able to get a true picture of the situation.

Future obligation by the law
Professionals of social and health services must remember that they are obliged by the law to advise and clarify. This obligation cannot be avoided by passing it on to presumed relatives or children.
Although the law does not oblige an adult to care for their loved ones, it is in many service processes a built-in assumption that a person has the help of someone close to them to achieve services. However, it should be remembered that there are also lonely people or people whose loved ones are not for one reason or another able to help. Relying on the help of loved ones can at worst lead to abuse or ill-treatment, especially for people with memory problems, whose language skills do not cover Finnish or Swedish, it can be difficult to tell others.
In finding out the memory situation and service needs, one should not make prior assumptions about the person, for example, based on his cultural background. Every person is an individual shaped by many things, who has individual needs and wishes. Professionals should practice self-reflection in what attitudes, with thoughts and values, he himself enters the service situation - is it what I personally consider good and desirable as life, a suitable model for that other person and how I value different choices through my own internal models.

Being heard and seen
There is often a lot of talk about dealing with a client with dementia. In another, to the topic of family care at the related event, Ruut Pylvänäinen, a trained experience expert in family care, has presented reflection on the meaning of meeting: Bears and wolves are met, birds and butterflies are heard and seen. This idea raises the question of whether there is always an additional element of tension in the encounter, which prevents us from being present in the situation completely calmly and with an open mind - especially when it's  based on our own preconceived notions, we feel afraid that our skills are sufficient in the situation and we forget our actual professionalism.

 

Translation by: Anne Waweru

 

The starting points in cultural sensitive memory work in Finland

 

The Finnish population is approximately 5.5 million persons. According to a study in 2015, 200 000 people in Finland are living with mild cognitive impairment and 193 000 with progressive memory disorders (Viramo & Sulkava 2015, 35). According to Statistics Finland, there are approximately 458 000 foreign-language speakers in Finland. And almost 60 000 of them were over 55 years old. (Tilastokeskus, 2021). 

Language- and cultural minorities in Finland

As everywhere in the world, the number of older migrants in Finland is growing constantly. Many people who migrated to Europe in the 1960s to 1980s are reaching an age when the risk of developing dementia is higher.  The structure of Finnish migrants is affected by the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 when the people from countries of the former Soviet Union became international migrants. That makes Russian- and Estonian-speaking people the largest migrant group in Finland. 

The personal situation and starting point of the people belonging to these language groups are slightly different compared to people migrating from outside of Europe. For example, the level of education can be quite high in those groups. But everything else related to knowledge about dementia or taboos – they are similar.

In our previous work, we developed knowledge about dementia with elderly from Russia-, Estonia-, Chinese-, Arabia-, and Somali-speaking groups. Also, one of our target groups – the Romany People – is an ethnic minority in Finland, who speaks Finnish, but 60% of the elderly in that group are illiterate.

 
Memory disorders do not care about language groups and it comes equally to everyone. That means that there are a lot of foreign-language speakers, living with mild cognitive impairment and with progressive memory disorders. That is a large and invisible group that is easily left out of services, for example, because of their poor Finnish language skills. However, their memory disorders should be treated as well. And it is the target group of our activity whose memory health we want to improve.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MUKES affects

 

The Finnish Centre for Cultural Diversity and Memory MUKES points out that the customer's background, language, culture, or health literacy should not be an obstacle to getting a memory test or to the timely diagnosis of a memory disorder. In a just society, all members should have equal access to health care – this also applies to the prevention, assessment, diagnosis, and treatment of memory disorders.
 
Currently, memory services do not serve minority groups with the efficiency, that would be appropriate in identifying and treating memory disorders. The Finnish multicultural memory center MUKES emphasizes that the planning and development of suitable memory services for the elderly, belonging to different linguistic and cultural minorities requires.
 
Strategy for the development of national culture-sensitive memory work training for professionals to work with linguistic and cultural minorities with dementia. The development of tools for timely memory disease diagnostics closer cooperation between national services and the third sector to implement the services

 

 

 

 

 

 

MUKES History

 

MUKES has been operating since 2020. We are the only activity in Finland that promotes culture-sensitive memory work. The first pilot project with Russian- and Estonian-speaking elderly started in 2003. The first Memory Counseling Center, which offered these two language group services for memory testing, was opened in Helsinki in 2004. Since 2015, this memory work with ethnic elderly groups has been taken forward by the 6-year ETNIMU project in Society for MemoryDisorders Expertise in Finland, which we are now continuing at MUKES.

 

Read more webpage archive: The Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU-activity 2015-2020

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cultural-sensitive Memory Work in Finland 

 

Pilots on Finnish memory work with ethnic minorities started in 2003 as a part of the IkäMAMU-activities of the Finnish Association for the Welfare of Older People. IkäMAMU mapped the situation of brain health among the Russian and Estonian-speaking residents of Helsinki. IkäMamu-activities also applied existing memory materials to work with the
Russian-speaking elderly with memory disorders and their family members. In 2004 services began for the Estonian and Russian-speaking customers at Kamppi service
center in Helsinki, where the Memory Clinic of the Helsinki Alzheimer’s Association operated. The memory clinic screened for memory impairments through assessment tests. Then, for the first time, a care pathway was created for the Estonian and the Russian-speaking elderly and their family members with social and health care professionals. At the time also a peer support group for Russian-speaking carers for the elderly with memory disorders was started.
The IkäMAMU-project was ended in the year 2005, and since then also the Memory Clinic of the Helsinki Alzheimer’s Association has stopped its services. The need for memory services in different languages, however, has not gone away – rather the opposite. Based on the feedback from different ethnic minority groups, the elderly would need and want to improve their brain health and gain more information about memory disorders in their native languages.

In order to meet such needs, Improving the Brain Health of Ethnic Minority Elderly, ETNIMUproject was started. In addition to the Estonian and Russian-speaking groups, that had already existed, new target groups included older Somali women and the Roma people.

Read an article about the Roma people in ETNIMU-project here: ROMA PEOPLE AS A TARGET GROUP IN THE BRAIN HEALTH PROMOTION PROJECT ETNIMU IN FINLAND

 

 

ETNIMU-project 2015-2017

 

The deterioration of brain health and memory disorders can affect us all regardless of our language, culture, or nationality. In Finland social and health services are equal for all. Nonetheless, not everyone in need of services can access them or find the kind of services that would meet their needs.

Finland has a population of approximately 5.5 million. 200 000 people are living with mild cognitive impairment and 193 000 with progressive memory disorders. According to Statistics Finland, there are approximately 310 000 foreign-language speakers in Finland. Memory disorders are as recurrent among this population as they are among the ethnic Finns. With prevalence rates adjusted to those of the ethnic Finns, this means that there are 11 200 foreign-language speakers living with mild cognitive impairment and 10 900 foreign-language speakers with progressive memory disorders. These people form a patient group who is easily left out of services, for example, because of their insufficient Finnish language skills. Their brain health, nevertheless, should be taken care of as well. When the baby boomers reach elderhood and the total number of the elderly increases, this question will become more pertinent.

Whether an ethnic Finn or a minority ethnic person, memory disorders proceed the same. Their treatment is in many ways the same. We need to highlight the issues that we should take into consideration when we meet an ethnic minority elderly person with memory problems. 

The most important issue is to remember that there is a human being behind her memory problems or memory disorder: this person has his/ her culture, personality, and wishes that should be taken into consideration.

Such an approach, which respects the person’s background and needs, is what we call cultural sensitivity as a way of work.

The Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland’s ETNIMU-project was a development project that took place from 2015 until 2017with the support of Veikkaus Oy. It sought to increase information about brain health among ethnic minority elderly. The project created materials about brain health, memory, and memory disorders in the native languages of the project’s participant groups: Finnish, Estonian, Russian, Somali, and Roma People. The project also aimed to strengthen the cultural-sensitive skills of social and health care professionals and students.

 

ETNIMU-activity 2018-2020

 

ETNIMU-activity developed cultural sensitive memory work in Finland 2015-2020. The aim of ETNIMU activities was to secure that people from ethnic minority backgrounds with dementia get timely and accurate diagnoses.

The MMSE is the memory test most commonly used with people from ethnic minority backgrounds in Finland. The test is well suited to the native populations, but it falls short when used to map the situations of people from diverse ethnic minority backgrounds. To get the necessary information, the test needs to screen also for background information f.ex. about a person's daily life, skills, and social activities. Difficulties in language and insufficient understanding of the cultural specificities pose the biggest challenges to mapping. The social and health care professionals would benefit from an interpreter who can help them perceive the client’s possible memory problems and provide them assistance in memory test situations.

The pilot group of the Memory Interpreter training program has 17 participants of Estonian, Russian, Arabic, Chinese, and Roma backgrounds. All participants are volunteers. The training program consists of a theory part that covers f.ex. general information about dementia, interpreting skills, confidentiality, and GDPR. The training is completed by a practical session at a Memory Clinic. After completing the training, the memory interpreters act independently as interpreters in memory test situations and help the social and health care professionals in their interactions with clients from different ethnic minority backgrounds.

ETNIMU activities have developed a unique training program in Finland that supports culturally sensitive memory work in cooperation with memory clinics, universities, as well as experts working in various fields. The Memory Interpreter training program and the working tools can be adapted to work with different languages and cultural backgrounds and so help to secure timely and accurate diagnosis of dementia.

 

Developed tools in ETNIMU-activity 2015-2020

 

See all our previous work and developed tools in Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU-activity 2015-2020 here:

 

CULTURAL SENSITIVITY IN MEMORY WORK: Experiences from Finland, 2019

 

 

Read the Guide here: Cultural Sensitivity in Memory Work: Experiences from Finland,  2019

Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU activity 2015-2020

 

 

Memory Interpreter material, 2020

 

Memory Interpreter material - is a tool that was developed parallel with the Memory Interpreter training program. This is a new tool, that Memory Interpreter is trained to use

 

Download The Memory Interpreter material in English, 2020 here

Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU activity 2015-2020

 

Brief Guide for the Persons Invited to Memory Test, 2020

 

Download The Brief Guide here.

Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU activity 2015-2020

 

Improving brain health!, 2019

 

Various information on memory and its functioning has been widely published in Finland. This guidebook Improving brain health! covers all the key topics and is easy to read and understand. 

Download guidebook Improving brain health! here

Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU activity 2015-2020

 

Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU activity 2015-2020

Exercises to activate the brain 1, 2019

This booklet is addressed to group leaders improving the mental well-being of elderly immigrants in Finland. The booklet contains 22 coordination and concentration exercises that support brain health by improving the interaction between the brain and muscles. Because the brain needs activation.

Even a small amount of physical activity and exercising may be critical for the quality of life. Aging impairs the ability to control muscles and movements. With regular exercise, we can slow these changes.

Exercise also improves mental well-being and supports memory. It is good to challenge yourself and to do something you have never tried before. New skills open new connections in the brain. The training of concentration skills promotes the functioning of memory in everyday chores.

An active lifestyle and social relationships are critical for maintaining brain health. Do these exercises in a group or alone at home. By exercising together, you get support from the others, and you may unexpectedly find yourself bursting out laughing, which is the best medicine ever. Learning a new movement is easier when exercising is fun, and when you repeat the movement several times.

The exercises are designed to go from easy to more difficult ones. The difficulty levels may also be increased by using different directions for the movements or including other body parts in the exercise, for example, by combining leg movements with arm movements. Exercises may be done either while sitting down or standing up. Create together with your group new moves and exercises.

 

 

Download guidebook Exercises to activate the brain 1 here

Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU activity 2015-2020

 

Exercises to activate the brain 2, 2019

This guidebook is addressed to group leaders aiming to improve the mental well-being of ethnic minority elderly in Finland. In this booklet, you find 26 different exercises for brain stimulation. From these exercises, you may create new ones for your group.

Memory training is a new trend in improving mental health. Every one of us can improve how the brain works. There is no good or bad memory. Our memory is working selectively by choosing only things that interest us most. By training perception and concentration, we can store the necessary information in our memory better if it is connected with emotions.

The easiest way to train memory is to focus on what we do, to develop a systematic approach, creativity, and imagination. Memory training is not so much about focusing on memory, but rather learning how to use memory by finding connections between information to be stored and information already known to us. When we see these connections and associations, remembering is easy.

Keeping your -body active guarantees physical health, but memory training has proven necessary and useful too. Memory exercises support and enhance our mental abilities. Although you may do the exercises presented in this booklet on your own, the joy of being together in a group makes you feel good and creates a pleasant feeling of being united with other people.

The exercises are designed to be used primarily for group lessons and co-creating conversations on selected topics, word games, manual activities (such as coloring), and adding new activities. Tasks and physical exercises may be combined to make the lesson even more vivid and versatile.

 

Download guidebook Exercises to activate the brain 2 here.

Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU activity 2015-2020

 

You will find all tools and materials in different languages here:  

ERIKIELISET MATERIAALIT

 

In Finnish for Roma people

In Estonian

In Russia

In Somali

In China

In Arabic

COVID-19                                    elderly migrants in Finland

 

Corona vaccinations divide opinions amongst older migrants in Finland - Nearly half wants a vaccination but many still have doubts, 2021.

 

Together with The Finnish Consortium of Intercultural Elderly Care, we have published a report - Corona vaccinations divide opinions amongst older migrants in Finland - Nearly half wants a vaccination but many still have doubts.

 

Click here to download our COVID-19 vaccinations report amongst older migrants in Finland

With the corona pandemic, concerns about the foreign-language speaking older group members arose among organizations that implement activities for them. Employees were concerned about how the group members would cope in unusual circumstances, whether they had received enough information to protect themselves from the coronavirus, and whether the information from authorities had reached the elderly belonging to ethnic and language minorities. These concerns developed into a collaborative study of the foreign-language speaking elderly and their coping in the unusual circumstances caused by the coronavirus in the spring of 2020. How are we doing? -report highlighted the thoughts of elderly people in the early stages of the corona crisis. The report points out that the authorities' information did not reach foreign-language speakers comprehensively enough, and that many older people relied on the help of relatives, friends, or third sector organization workers. A clear wish from the older people was to receive information in their native language and in a way that was accessible for them. For some older people with a foreign background, it is already challenging to apply for services which is due to the lack of accessibility and equality of services. Accessibility of services became a particularly burning issue during the health and well-being affected by the corona crisis, as the older persons belong to a risk group regarding COVID-19. 

Translated by Mari Pöllänen, JADE Activity Centre

Multicultural Memory Centre - The Finnish Society for Memory Work, 2021

How are we doing? - report, 2020

 

Report on the COVID-19 Pandemic's Effects on the Lives of Older Migrants in Finland.

Click here to download our report How are we doing?

Society for Memory Disorders Expertise in Finland, ETNIMU activity 2015-2020