Everybody's Business - Nine years on

This week we have heard calls around the need to refresh the National Dementia Strategy for England. I don't recall reading about the strategy nor it being referenced in the media for the best of a couple of years, with the focus seemingly being on the Prime Minister's Challenge on dementia. It almost felt like someone's electronic diary had flashed up a warning reminder that the NDS 'ends' in 2014. I look forward to seeing work carried out to produce a much leaner version, that will hopefully contain less than 17 key action points this time around...

Strengthening the Involvement of People with Dementia and their Carers was a toolkit produced in partnership with people living with dementia and carer organisations for the strategy, I wonder how many people are aware of its existence? It can still be found on a few websites and many of its key actions are as relevant as ever http://dementiapartnerships.com/resource/strengthening-involvement/

The National Dementia Strategy references England's wider strategy for Older Peoples' Mental Health. Everybody's Business was published by the Care Services Improvement Partnership in 2005. Rather surprisingly this remains the most recet version of any national strategy around the subject.  In 2007 the Health Service Journal  reported:

........it is often assumed people with dementia must be cared for in specialist residential homes, even though most people with this diagnosis live at home in their communities, supported by families, neighbours and mainstream services.

CSIP has found that services supporting adults of working age, such as befriending or outreach services, stop when an individual reaches the age of 65. Ageism is alive and well unfortunately, despite the provisions of standard one of the national service framework for older people.

The Department of Health has recently announced that it will be developing a dementia strategy over the next year. Again, it will not be producing new policy but focusing on how to implement what we already know needs to be done.

This is great news. CSIP is playing its part in developing the strategy and providing implementation support through its national and regional resources. However, we will also continue to work on behalf of all those older people with other mental health problems, such as delirium and depression, to make sure services meet their needs. Read the full article at HSJ http://www.hsj.co.uk/resource-centre/older-peoples-mental-health-at-csip/198331.article#.UtLD2c9hDWw

It is great news that there is to be a refresh of the National Dementia Strategy, perhaps it is also time to revisit what is Everybody's Business, after all, we are told that 25% of adults over 65 will develop dementia, which means 75% won't, but they may live with or develop a number of mental health conditions.....

Tony Jameson-Allen
Twitter @TJA_evonet