A first-of-its-kind day facility for Alzheimer’s patients that also specifically helps their families has opened on Long Island.
Amityville’s new Barbara Rabinowitz Education & Resource Center includes even a special transit-focused room to teach families how to travel with their affected loved ones — using items such as real LIRR train seats and an airplane row.
“I’d never even imagined something like this — it would have just made life easier,” said Barbara’s son Michael Rabinowitz, who worked with the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America to open the 11,500-square-foot location named after his mom.
“Something like this will just teach you how to live with it. It’s a whole new world for you,” the Oyster Bay man told The Post.
The site is designed for professionals to aid the families of the estimated 60,000 Long Islanders battling dementia on how to better manage their circumstances, as well as create a more calm environment for the patients themselves. The center also conducts regular memory screenings.
Initial programming for patients focuses on enjoyable ways for them to spend their time, such as poetry in motion, karaoke, “mind games” including true or false questions, sensory-themed bingo and a special “Wheel of Fortune” themed word game coming Friday.
Helping families who need it most
Rabinowitz, a recently retired 67-year-old investment banker, lost his 89-year-old mother in 2022 after she fought Alzheimer’s for six years.
“We didn’t even know how to approach it,” Rabinowitz said of the disease. “The family suffers the most. … It’s a real struggle, and people who haven’t gone through it really wouldn’t know. It’s hard to explain.”
He and his family launched the Rabinowitz Charitable Foundation in 2003 and have contributed to causes such as children with special needs and multiple sclerosis, which Rabinowitz’s father suffered from, before turning to Alzheimer’s issues.
Rabinowitz reached out to a close friend to bring the facility to LI — former local state Sen. Chuck Fuschilio, who has been the AFA’s president and CEO since retiring from politics just over 10 years ago.
Fuschilio began scouring the South Shore for an appropriate location for the site, with the search leading him to a property across from and owned by Dominican Village, home to the world’s oldest nun and other members of the Catholic order.
“There was a higher calling, so we all won,” he said with a smile. “This center will fill a significant need for so many families, and we’re very proud of that.”
Rabinowitz is most impressed by “not so much the science, but the psychology” that went into the facility’s planning, as it also includes several sensory rooms to help handle dementia in a relaxing manner.
He was happy to lead the charge on getting the property set to go, as labors of love run in the family.
The son described Brooklynite Barbara — who cared not only for her own mother but also for her husband — as the one who taught him why it’s essential to do good for others in life.
“There was a lot of pressure on her, coming from very humble beginnings. They had very little, but they were great parents. They gave us what they had,” he said.
“They would be unbelievably proud of this.”
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