PRESENTER Kaye Adams has told how she felt herself "shutting down" during an experiment to simulate the effects of living with dementia.

The 53-year-old spent time in a training unit designed to help student nurses empathise with and better understand how to care for patients.

Kaye and her BBC Radio Scotland colleague John Beattie, were "aged" with special equipment for a new series 'Memories and Conversations' focused on dementia, which affects around 90,000 Scots.

They were given goggles to simulate visual impairment and a headset playing distorted domestic sounds to affect hearing.

They also had their gloved fingers taped together to mimic aged-related joint problems and the loss of tactile sensitivity.

The pair were then given a series of simple tasks to do in a mocked-up home environment, including setting a table for one, pouring a glass of water, making a phone call and fastening a cardigan. Kaye's response to the experiment was dramatic.

She said: "I couldn't live with that.

"I just felt myself shutting down, it was miserable, I could see no value in it.

"I've got a neighbour who is 75 and I've asked her if she is afraid of dying and she said, 'there's worse things than dying.' That's how I feel now."

However, when interviewed later, Kaye acknowledges that for her and John, the effects were instant, while the onset of ageing and dementia would be a gradual process with incremental changes. With some "relatively easy adaptations" the experience, she says, would have been far less traumatic.

She said: "The impact it had on me to make me really withdraw and just kind of shrink.

"If someone had been too forward with me, I know I would have recoiled from them.

"Obviously it would happen over time, whereas this was an instant change.

"Apart from the empathy factor there are some really practical things you can do to make life easier,

"The cup I was going to pour was a clear tumbler and it had a split down the side. With the goggles I couldn't see that so I poured it and it spilled. Had it been easier to get my hands around and brightly coloured, yes I would have managed that.

"For most people, their greatest ill health fear is dementia. We fear it, the sense of self being eroded.

"Dementia is a huge health issue and there is no real good story to be told but it would be nice if we didn't always attach it to the person.

"We never see any positives. It's just a bad story. My aunt had dementia but certainly in the earlier stages she was still the person she was. "She was the favourite aunty, a very generous, no judgement person.

"We still had some lovely times together, even when she was beginning to go through dementia. She could still be lovely company.

"We seem to have completely screened that out, it's just a bad thing to have, it's a bad situation to be in.

"It's that arrogance we have, when we are 'at peak'. Anyone who is less than 'at peak' can be treated with derision.

"We've got to challenge that."

The experience was an emotional one for John, 58, whose mum died when she was 78 after suffering from vascular dementia for the final years of her life.

He said: "All these years on, this was the first time I understood. And without beating around the bush, it was a very emotional moment when you suddenly realise what she must have been going through."

The experiment was led by Margaret Brown of the UWS-based Alzheimer Scotland Centre for Policy and Practice and Dr Barbara Sharp, Policy and Research Advisor at Alzheimer Scotland.

Dr Sharp said: "We hope that the BBC Scotland programme will raise further awareness of dementia and its diverse impact on those living with the condition.”

Inside Dementia will be aired on BBC Radio Scotland on Wednesday June 7 at 13.32pm as part of the Memories and Conversations series.

Launching today, to mark Scottish Dementia Awareness Week, the project explores the potential of using key news and sport events, music and stills from the BBC archive to trigger memories and stimulate conversation in people with dementia.

More than a thousand photos, audio and video clips have been uploaded to a new interactive website, Your Memories (http://bbc.co.uk/taster/projects/your-memories).

Carers can type in basic biographical information about a person to create a personalised slideshow of pictures, music and video from the BBC to evoke memories of childhood and early adult life.