Do You Know Me Now? – A New Documentary from Cognitive Dynamics

Thursday, April 30th, 2015

Are you, or is someone you love a caregiver for a person with Alzheimer’s disease or another dementia? Are you in need of inspiration and hope amidst this experience? Do you find it difficult to reach your loved one, to remain in relationship with them due to their memory loss?

Do You Know Me Now? seeks to show you ways in which you can reach your loved in the moment and have a mutually fulfilling relationship with them – one which discovers the person beneath the disease and builds upon remaining abilities and personality traits that still remain.

Our film will tell the inspirational stories of Cathie Borrie and her mother (The Long Hello: Memory, My Mother and Me), Rita and James Houston, and Lester Potts, and will share the wisdom and experience of well-known experts such as Naomi Feil (founder of The Validation Training Institute), and Alzheimer’s advocates such as Lynda Everman and Don Wendorf.

Life is about relationships, and these relationships need not be lost due to Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias. This trailer for Do You Know Me Now? is part of a crowd-funding campaign which will start in May, 2015, and seeks to raise the funds necessary to complete this documentary and get it out to you, to your loved ones, and to the world.

You may watch the film’s trailer here: https://youtu.be/9rLyDgti1h8

Please be watching for a crowd funding release on Indiegogo in May, 2015.

Cathie Borrie, Daniel Potts, Judith Murray, Rita Houston and James Houston

Thank you.

Naomi Feil and Daniel C. Potts

Lester E. Potts, Jr.

Cognitive Dynamics President Selected as AAN Fellow 

Friday, September 19th, 2014

Daniel C. Potts, M.D., Founder and President of Cognitive Dynamics Foundation has been selected as a Fellow of the American Academy of Neurology (AAN), that organization’s highest membership category. Fellow status acknowledges exemplary work and achievements in the neurosciences, the clinical practice of neurology or academic/administrative neurology, in the AAN and in the individual’s community as a whole.  Dr. Potts’s advocacy for persons who have dementia and their caregivers, especially in the area of expressive arts and creativity- based programming for quality of life improvement, figured strongly in his selection for this honor.

Dr. Potts Speaks on Persistence of Personhood in Dementia

Tuesday, January 10th, 2012

In early December 2011 Cognitive Dynamics President Daniel C. Potts, M.D. was honored to speak for Dr. Michael Parker’s Gerontology end-of -the-year celebration in the Department of Social Work at the University of Alabama.  The topic was the persistence of personhood in late stage Alzheimer’s disease.  Dr. Potts used the example of his father’s late stage Alzheimer’s art to illustrate the incredible creative power of the mind, even the mind ravaged by Alzheimer’s disease, and advocated for person-centered care in these individuals, including the use of the expressive arts therapies.  The Chair of the Alabama Department of Geriatric Psychiatry, the head of the University of Alabama Elderlaw Center, the Executive Director of Caring Days and the head of the Tuscaloosa VA Medical Center were in attendance.

Dr. Michael Parker's class at the Univeristy of Alabama

Drs. Potts and Powers appear on Alabama Public Television’s “For the Record”

Tuesday, April 26th, 2011

http://aptv.org/VideoRoom/viewprogram.asp?FileID=1397

Dr. Potts to be Master of Ceremonies for AAN Advocacy Meeting

Tuesday, January 11th, 2011

Daniel C. Potts, M.D., President and founder of Cognitive Dynamics Foundation will be Master of Ceremonies for the 2011 edition of the American Academy of Neurology’s award-winning advocacy training program, the Donald M. Palatucci Advocacy Leadership Forum, in San Diego, CA 1/13 -1/16. The opening address for the group will highlight the amazing and inspiring story of Alzheimer’s artist Lester E. Potts, Jr.!
http://www.aan.com/go/advocacy/active/palf

Cognitive Dynamics Advisory Board Welcomes New Member

Tuesday, January 4th, 2011

David W. Streets, seen here with Cognitive Dynamics President Daniel C. Potts, M.D.

Cognitive Dynamics is pleased to welcome David W. Streets, owner of David W. Streets-Beverly Hills Fine Art and Appraisal Services, as the newest member of its advisory board. The foundation is grateful to David for hosting “Painting in Twilight, An Artist’s Escape from Alzheimer’s”, in which Lester Potts’s watercolors and story were featured. The art from that gala is still on display at the David Streets Galleries in Beverly Hills, and is available for purchase (http://www.davidstreetsbeverlyhills.com/).

Cognitive Dynamics is honored to have the following individuals on its advisory board: Anjan Chatterjee, M.D. ( Professor, Dept of Neurology, Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Pennsylvania), Meril Platzer, M.D., neurologist and National Alzheimer’s Advocate, Woodland Hills, CA), Carol Prickett PhD., MT-BC (Chair of Music Therapy, the University of Alabama), Vicki Kerr (Executive Director Caring Days Adult Daycare Center, Tuscaloosa, AL), Susan Austin-Warner Sc. D. ( Executive Director Westervelt-Warner Museum of American Art, Tuscaloosa, AL), Angel Duncan MA-MFT, ATR (Program Director for Senior Helpers; Adjunct Professor at Notre Dame de Namur University), Don Irwin (Steinway Artist and internationally-acclaimed concert pianist, Houston, TX), David W. Streets, Owner of David W. Streets-Beverly Hills Fine Art and Appraisal Services, Ellen W. Potts, BA, MBA (President, Dementia Dynamics, LLC),

The “Art to Life” Initiative

Saturday, January 1st, 2011

Honors course flyer

”Art to Life” is a first-of-its-kind initiative to improve the quality of life of Alzheimer’s patients in rural Alabama through the expressive arts therapies. In partnership with the University of Alabama Honors College and Sewing Seeds of Hope, a non-profit foundation in Perry County Alabama, Cognitive Dynamics Foundation seeks to facilitate the creation and preservation of the life stories of Alzheimer’s patients living in Alabama’s impoverished “Black belt” region (named so because of the richness of the soil from the area). This region is steeped in history and is underserved medically, economically, culturally, etc. Through art therapy, music therapy and reminiscence, with sessions documented on film, it is hoped that the life stories of each patient can be teased out and preserved for posterity, as a family keepsake, and to be used as ongoing therapy for the patient. Furthermore, dementia education will be given to the families of these patients. Students involved in the course will be given education on dementia and care giving, expressive arts therapies, life story elicitation, etc. At the end of the course a showcase is planned for the families and patients, community and media to display the results. This initiative is planned to be ongoing, so that all regions of the Black belt may eventually be reached. Grants and other funding opportunities are being sought. Those interested in supporting the initiative financially are urged to donate by clicking the link on our home page.