# 3 - Rehabilitación cognitiva a través de los jardines y la horticultura terapéutica

[Music] Welcome to a new episode of the Neuropaisagism Podcast. Gardenery and therapeutic horticulture. Today, we are going to talk about cognitive rehabilitation through gardens and therapeutic horticulture. And as this podcast is taking its first steps, I'll tell you what I'm going to talk about throughout the episodes about gardenery and therapeutic horticulture, about paisagism, about theories such as the restoration of attention, the reduction of stress, and many more that are associated with contact with nature, contact with plants and soil. Now then, today I'm going to talk about cognitive rehabilitation through green areas, as I told you at the beginning, and about therapeutic horticulture. And I'll start by consulting the dictionary of the Real Academy of Spanish to define that word with many words for my liking, which is the one for rehabilitating. And the dictionary tells us to rehabilitate something or someone or to restitute things to their state. And it also tells us to reestablish, regenerate, reeducate, correct, amend, restore, reform, repair, rebuild, recover, and other words, in accordance with the context in which we use this word. All of them leave us implicit that there is a deterioration that modifies its initial state, right? In this case, it refers to the brain, to the decrease in the mental capacities that affect various functions such as memory, such as attention, language, and even reasoning. And so, as our computer, our computer fails, and the causes of these failures can be multiple and of different complexity or gravity, the same thing happens with our biological CPU, to call it in some way, our brain. So, this deterioration condition can be manifested in different degrees. From light problems, how to forget where an object has been left, for example, where you left the car keys, to more severe forms that prevent independent life and require external care. A specific category is the slight cognitive deterioration, which considers an intermediate stage between normal aging and dementia. People with light cognitive deterioration can experience loss of memory and difficulties in the language, but they generally maintain the ability to perform most of the daily activities. Although some cases of light cognitive deterioration can be reversible, others may progress to severe dementia, such as Alzheimer's disease. Here, the magic of our brain, our processing unit, enters the game. We already know that it is not central, as it was believed a long time ago, and that it has led me to study neurosciences to apply it here to the paisagism. But better not look at me because we are going to see it throughout the different episodes of this podcast. The magic I am referring to refers to neuroplasticity, that ability that the brain has to reorganize and form new neural connections throughout life. This property is fundamental in cognitive rehabilitation, as it allows people with light cognitive deterioration to recover abilities and lost functions through practice and cognitive stimulation. Cognitive rehabilitation techniques include training programs that focus on specific areas such as memory, attention, reasoning. These programs can be adapted to individual needs and are often included in practical exercises and games that stimulate neural paths, thus promoting the improvement of cognitive abilities. As years go by, another interesting aspect enters the brain reserve, which is the ability of the brain to tolerate changes without showing significant clinical symptoms. In this section, we could say that this is the brain reserve related to the physical structure of the brain and cognitive reserve, which refers to the ability of the brain to use neural networks efficiently or to generate alternative networks. All this long introduction that I have made with which I hope not to have made you bored is to highlight that the gardenery and therapeutic artichokes will work, moving from these through cognitive stimulation, training of abilities, taking advantage of that cognitive reserve, generating activities that promote social interaction, physical exercise and, of course, always adapted to individual needs. And better, let's take this into practice. When we talk about rehabilitation of reversible cognitive deterioration, we can say that the activities offer a holistic approach to cognitive rehabilitation, taking advantage of the benefits of interaction with nature and participation in significant activities. If we want to highlight cognitive benefits, we can say that there is an improvement in concentration and attention, that there is a stimulation of memory, that there is a development of planning and organization abilities, which we can also achieve a rise in the resolution of problems. If we talk about therapeutic activities, we would have to mark five points. The first is the planning of the garden, because it will stimulate the executive functions and the memory of the work. Second, we would talk about care and care for plants, because it improves the sustained attention and the procedural memory. Third, we can work on the identification of plants and flowers, because we are going to favor the semantic memory and learning. Fourth, we have the creation of floral arrangements. In this way, then, we will develop creativity and visual-spatial abilities. And a fifth therapeutic activity, we can refer to the maintenance of the garden, which will promote the routine on the one hand and also the temporary organization. When we want to implement a therapeutic garden garden program, we have to adapt the activities to the level of capacity of each individual. We are also going to establish goals that must be realistic and achievable. We are going to provide a safe and accessible environment, so that my original project is called "Inclusive Gardens", because it refers to accessibility on the one hand, on the physical side, on the sensory side and also cognitive. In addition, in the implementation of the program, we are going to promote the social interaction, so that the gardenery and the horticulture is also called social and therapeutic. We are going to incorporate sensory elements, such as the textures, the aromas and the colors. As you can see, there are many things in which gardenery and horticulture can help when activities are diagrammed and coordinated by specialists such as horticultural therapists and other health professionals, such as occupational therapists who have the training to work with nature, with gardens and gardens. And much more when gardens are designed in an inclusive and therapeutic way. To end this episode, I want to return to my initial expression about the word "rehabilitation", because, as I told you, it has many words for my liking. What I try to say is that I consider that we handle ourselves, in some cases, on how that brain was supposed to be before the deterioration and that, on that path, the integrity of the person is lost, reducing it only to that organ, which is the brain. I hope, as a horticulture therapist, that this episode does not involve people as a fractioned element, but rather I am focusing on one of the aspects that I am working on, studying and learning about neuroscience. That's all for today. I hope you liked this episode. Share it with those people you consider to be useful, that can help them. And, of course, leave me your comment, leave me the five stars. I already thank you in advance for that positive evaluation, because it will allow this content to reach more people, help more people so that they can get closer to the garden and the horticulture therapist, so that they can find in a biodiverse garden something more than an aesthetic element that decorates a home, that decorates a health center, a hospital or a clinic, so that it allows nature to embrace us and help us heal. Until the next episode and thank you very much. [Music] [Music]