Studies have shown that therapy gardens help patients and residents of long-term care facilities experience less stress, lowered blood pressure and improvements in mood and socialization and have a more balanced circadian rhythm. Alzheimer’s patients, meanwhile, experience a decrease in aggressive behavior.
Managers and owners of long-term care facilities have also recognized that therapy gardens not only improve quality of life for their residents (and staff), they have financial benefits, too.
Therapy gardens add curb appeal and value to a long-term care facility in the same way that landscaping improves a home, said Peg Schofield, a registered horticulturalist and the director of horticulture at Cathedral Village, a continuing care retirement community in Philadelphia.
“You only have one chance to make a first impression,” she said. “What’s it going to be? What is it worth to you?” If a prospective resident has gardens at home, she said, that person will likely want to move to a long-term care facility that has gardens.
“It may cost you money to have this stuff, but the marketability of it will pay tenfold in the long run, and it will certainly add to the quality of life of your residents or patients,” she said. “And it’ll impress the hell out of the families.”
While a typical therapy garden may cost between $50,000 and $100,000, said Jack Carman, a landscape architect and owner and founder of Design for Generations in Medford, N.J., a beginner’s garden could cost less.
“It doesn’t have to be that expensive to get it started and it can be phased,” he said, and donations can help with costs. “It’s easier to find donations for a garden than a lot of other things. It’s a tangible thing. People understand it and they’re willing to give money for it.”
Some of the facilities for which Carman has designed gardens have charged more for rooms overlooking the garden. “People are willing to spend more for real estate that overlooks nature in the mountains or the beach, and that’s not any different in some type of senior community,” he said.
And, he noted, facilities with gardens may have an easier time retaining staff because they offer a nice work environment. “If they have a garden that they can go sit outside in, that helps them reduce stress or just chill out from work a little bit,” he said.
Gardens are “not inexpensive,” said Susan Gilster, PhD, executive director of the Alois Alzheimer Center in Cincinnati, which has four gardens and will soon open a fifth. “I think (the gardens are) undoubtedly, absolutely well worth it. Every penny.”
“I think if it’s done right,” she said, “it’s absolutely worth the money.”
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