Services
Voluntary services:
a) Providing home help to the aged and infirm. This may include cook food for them, do necessary cleaning and washing.
b) Alleviate loneliness through regular visits by the volunteers and spending time with them.
c) Transport to attend Friday prayers and social events. This helps many of our elderly in enjoying some social life as they are unable to mix in mainstream society due to language, religious and cultural barriers.
d) Transport to doctors, help them in day-to-day shopping.
Arranging Culturally Appropriate Care:a) Negotiating placement of our elderly in Aged Care homes which can cater for cultural and religious specific needs of Muslim elderly.
b) Negotiating home care services through various agencies and service providers with special consideration of cultural and religious specific needs of Muslim elderly.
Gatherings and Entertainment for the Elderly:
SAMAA organizes regular gatherings, information sessions, and picnics for the elderly. These include Harbour cruises, picnics in the parks, religious festivals, cultural evenings which may include sub-continental music, poetry and other entertainment. On such occasions, informative talks are arranged by aged care specialists from various aged care agencies and professionals such as university professors, doctors, nurses and other experts in the field.
Each year SAMAA organizes the annual event which is attended by government officials, community leaders and families of the elderly.
During COVID pandemic, SAMAA had to abandon physical gatherings for seniors. Thus SAMAA engaged actively with the community seniors through regular Zoom programmes which proved very popular. A weekly virtual Zoom session during Ramadan proved very popular where many seniors joined the live video sessions while many more watched the recordings at a later stage. More than 25 zoom programmes were held in total.
The community doctors and health professionals volunteered to give very useful talks. They spoke about COVID-19 disease, the ways to stay fit to minimise the risks and important health guidelines for seniors in order to cope with the pandemic. They also spoke about anxiety and ways to stay relaxed during the lockdown.
Religious sermons during Ramadan and poetry, singing and other cultural entertainment at other times, kept seniors engaged during difficult COVID times.
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