Dementia Support Program in New York City
Caring for someone with dementia can feel overwhelming. You don’t have to figure it out alone. COHME’s Dementia Support Program puts a dedicated dementia specialist … a social worker with advanced dementia training … and our whole clinical team behind your family, with coaching, engagement activities, and counseling shaped around your loved one. Serving Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Queens.
A Specialist for Your Family, Backed by a Whole Team
Most home care stops at the aide. The Dementia Support Program adds the layer families tell us they were missing: a staff dementia specialist … a social worker whose whole focus is dementia … working alongside COHME’s nurses and social workers to guide the people who provide the daily care, whether that’s a COHME aide, a family member, or both.
The program is flexible by design. It works alongside COHME home care, so your aide and your specialist reinforce each other. And it’s also available on its own, for families whose loved one isn’t a COHME home care client.
The program is led by Leslie Mantrone, LMSW, COHME’s Dementia Specialist, together with social worker Jamie Meconi and our clinical team.
One Program, Three Kinds of Help
- Practical skills and techniques for whoever provides the daily care … your aide, your family, or both. Recommended weekly, and guidance is available any time, including by phone.
- A personalized schedule of activities … art, music, pet therapy, nature-based projects … built from the specialist’s assessment of your loved one’s abilities, interests, and history. Typically twice per month.
- Counseling for the family carrying the load, by phone and in person, with help planning ahead and connections to trusted community resources.
From First Visit to Steady Support
An In-Home Assessment
The dementia specialist gets to know your loved one and your family: strengths, challenges, routines, and the home itself. That becomes the base for everything that follows.
A Personalized Plan
Together you choose what your family needs … coaching sessions, an enrichment schedule, family counseling, or all three … each at its own rhythm. Coaching is usually weekly; enrichment typically runs twice a month.
Ongoing Support That Adjusts
Sessions continue as long as they help, with written strategies and follow-up guidance between visits. As the dementia progresses, the plan progresses with it.
Built for the People Doing the Caring
The program serves both sides of every dementia story: the person living with it, and the people caring for them. It fits families at every stage … early on, when you mostly need to understand what’s normal and what’s coming; and further along, when behaviors are harder and the days feel heavier.
You don’t need to have everything figured out before you call. Telling us what your weeks look like is enough to start.
What Your Social Worker Does, at No Charge
Built on what your loved one CAN do.
The specialist’s assessment starts from remaining abilities and interests, not from deficits.
Real-life skills you can use the same day.
Coaching is practical: techniques for actual moments, in your actual home.
Connection over task lists.
The aim is more good moments together, with anxiety and confusion eased rather than managed at arm’s length.
A non-profit’s reasons.
COHME has served New York since 1984 to provide care, and support the people giving it … this program is that mission, applied to dementia.
The Program and Your Aide, Working Together
For COHME home care families, the program doesn’t sit beside the care … it runs through it. The specialist coaches your aide on your loved one specifically. The enrichment plan gives the aide activities for the days between visits. And the nurse’s plan of care picks up what the specialist learns. One team, one person at the center.
Dementia Support Program Questions, Answered
You Don’t Have to Do This Alone
Dementia asks a lot of families. Nobody handed you a manual … so we bring one, along with the person who wrote it. Talk with our team about what your family is carrying, and let’s lighten it.