A care home in West Drayton took a walk on the wild side when residents were given the opportunity to get up close and personal to a host of creatures and critters from around the globe.

The Care UK team at The Burroughs care home on Mill Road invited animal therapy specialists, ZooLab, to lead a ‘show and tell’ workshop with residents. 

A host of exotic animals, including a giant snail, scorpion, tree frog, snake, and tarantula, were among those presented to residents.  

As part of the session, ZooLab provided interesting facts on each of the individual animals, and residents who dared were also able to handle and stroke the interesting creatures.

Home manager Josephine Thomas said: “We are always looking to plan interesting and exciting activities for residents, and as so many have a keen interest in nature and wildlife, we invited ZooLab along to provide a fun animal therapy session.  

“It proved to be a real success and you could see from residents’ reactions just how engaged and fascinated they were by the chance to get so close to such a varied collection of animals.

"Not only did the workshop fit really well with our ‘activity based care’ approach here at The Burroughs, it was also fantastic to see the smiles on everyone’s faces, and we believe it had real therapeutic benefits for residents – especially those living with dementia.”

The Burroughs is a state-of-the-art care home which provides full-time residential and specialist dementia care, as well as short-term respite care. 

Article supplied by Madeleine Read