Title : Make a difference
Abstract:
In the UK an Admiral Nurse survey in 2023, found that carers needed help and support with a variety of issues that included coordinating care, communicating with the variety of different specialists and support networks plus accessing information to help them understand the condition.
Carers are people in their own right, with their own physical and emotional needs, and with their own obligations. It is important to ensure that carers supporting someone living with dementia can continue to live their own lives as fully as possible.
Local services are still unable to address the gaps in support for people and families living with dementia. Gaps such as respite, access to timely social, financial and legal assessments. These now take months not weeks.
Meanwhile families are coping alone and their mental health and family support networks are under great strain. Respite is even harder to achieve since the Pandemic which shut down many dementia services in the world, especially day centres for people with moderate to severe dementia.
Whilst there are a variety of organizations that provide support for carers in the UK, this presentation will revisit a non pharmacological intervention from the UK. The aim being to encourage our visitors and delegates to recognize that, to be an effective caregiver a person needs to take care of themselves, their relative is relying on them. Importantly this means the care givers are relying on us to recognize their needs.
Since 2011, Cogs clubs have been filling the gap in the services for people with mild cognitive difficulties. They provide a much needed day of respite for carers and a day of stimulation for the person. This intervention has been operating for 16 year. It was operating in Italy until the Pandemic closed activities with close interactions. It continued in UK and Eire under the banner of Mental Health support groups. I recommended this intervention to the delegates as being sustainable and adaptable for carers in any country.
