Talking turkey Although it may feel an odd topic to broach over the Thanksgiving dinner table, the Surgeon General declared Thanksgiving, 27th of November, as the day for families to share their health history –Announcement: National Family History Day — November 24, 2016. That’s because your genetic inheritance significantly affects your risk of developing a range […]
Talking turkey – and should this Friday be black or blue? Read More »
Seeing the wood for the trees Your brain processes elements of a scene in parallel, then adds them up or integrates them to make meaning – known as ‘Feature Integration’ – A feature-integration theory of attention. We were born with some ‘priors’ or assumptions about how things usually work in the world – light from above
Pre-school and dementia care – building common ground Read More »
Messy science It’s notoriously tough to run lighting experiments in the ‘real world’. In residential healthcare, it’s even harder. After all, your subjects may not be around for more than a few months, measuring personal light exposure is difficult – Wearable monitoring for evaluating non-visual effects of light on health and well-being: a systematic review. Building and
Messy science – and the sound of privacy Read More »
International Stress Awareness Week The World Health Organisation describes stress as “A state of worry or mental tension caused by a difficult situation. Stress is a natural human response that prompts us to address challenges and threats in our lives. Everyone experiences stress to some degree. The way we respond to stress, however, makes a
Stress-busting lightbulbs – and a podcast about red, white and blue Read More »
Feeling safe enough to sleep? As we wrap up National Home Security month with darker evenings, there’s lots of talk about crime waves sparked by the clock change, mostly sponsored by companies trying to sell you a floodlight or a camera-activated doorbell. But there is some evidence that more crimes like burglaries and criminal damage
Making peace with the dark – and zombie zoom effects Read More »
World information overload day 😉 Happens to be the same as world statistics day… Your brain is whirring along at around 10 bits/second, while your senses are collecting data at 109 bits/second – The unbearable slowness of being: Why do we live at 10 bits/s? It’s no secret that processing speed slows down with age. But other
World information overload day… – and allotments inside Read More »
What do Google and Chanel have in common? The smart building leads for these iconic brands will both be talking to me about why they’ve put human resources in the driving seat when it comes to choosing and implementing their smart building systems, along with Tomas Mac Eoin, Chief Executive of Hereworks, at the Smart
Control freaks – and bearded ladies Read More »
Can you sleep at night if the people in your care can’t? As a care provider, how would you feel if you came into work in the morning and found someone in your care had fallen and spent two hours lying in pain on the floor, knowing you could have done something about it? That
Creating great places to sleep – a duty of care Read More »
Counting down to the Care Show! I’ll be banging on about the business case for circadian lighting in residential care – and of course hoping to win the National Care Forum Innovation Challenge (please come along to stand C10 and say ‘hello’ and vote for us too!) But the real win will be the opportunity
How old is old? – and the business case for lighting Read More »
World Car-Free Day I’ve inherited my Dad’s Brompton – he was an avid cyclist all his life – another thing he passed on to me. But, just like Dad, lots of older adults stop cycling, feeling too wobbly on their feet to take the risk. And yet, paradoxically, cycling is the best exercise you can
On your bike – and pitching for the purple pound Read More »