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Our hospice and palliative care team decided this weekend to do the “Thickened Liquid Challenge.”  This is a simple challenge that is mainly focused on putting ourselves in the shoes of our patients who are prescribed thickened liquids (or perhaps I should say drink from their cups).

The rules are simple:

  • 12 Hour Challenge: All fluids must be thickened to “honey consistency” using a beverage thickener for a 12 hour contiguous period. Food does not have to be thickened.
  • Mini-challenge: drink an 8 ounce drink thickened to honey consistency (coffee, wine, juice, water, or any drink of your choice)
  • Videotape yourself and include an announcement that you accept the challenge
  • If you fail the challenge you must donate $20 to a geriatrics or palliative care charity of your choice (see notes below for some suggestions)
  • At the end of your challenge, nominate a minimum of three other people/teams to participate in the challenge.
  • When posting the challenge online, please use the hashtag #thickenedliquidchallenge


We’ll spend some time on the next post about the data behind thickened liquids for individuals with dementia and other diseases where swallowing is an issue (spoiler alert: it’s not good, despite the fact that 8% of patients in skilled nursing facilities are taking thickened liquids).

by: Eric Widera (@ewidera)‬

Note: here are some good hospice, palliative care, and geriatrics charities to consider:



Geriatrics: 

Hospice and Palliative Care: 

Other notable organizations:

12 Hour Challenges Accepted (if you do a 12 hour challenge, we’ll post it on GeriPal even if you don’t finish):

 

 

Note: This post is part of the series on the #ThickenedLiquidChallenge.  To watch the videos of this challenge check out the videos on YouTube:

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