Chen Zhiya's first experience of dementia happened when she was a sophomore student at university. One day during that Spring Festival, her grandmother suddenly left home in an irritated state, and died in an accident. It was not until one year later that she learned that her grandmother had suffered from Alzheimer's disease for years.

"Now with this old people's home, I want to do something for the elderly people who have dementia, to make up for any previous shortcomings," she says.

In the first two years after the home opened, Chen received a lot of Alzheimer patients who had not been properly looked after.

"Some people were covered with scratches and bruises, and were in a terrible state. Their families did not know what to do," she says.

Besides memory loss, late-stage Alzheimer patients display other symptoms such as leaving home unexpectedly and delusions of persecution and theft, causing deep distress.

What is worse, some patients have no idea what to do with feces, so that they may smear it on the walls or put them on other people's beds.

"Their families have no idea why they behave like that and even think they deliberately make things difficult, so that they may just lock the patients in a small room. After several months, when they sent the patients to our home, they were in a terrible state," she says.