Hertfordshire Dementia Champions form Community of Practice
Hertfordshire Dementia Champions are forming a Community of Practice, hosted by the University of Hertfordshire’s Centre for Research in Primary and Community Care, to create a high quality support network for clinicians working in dementia across the county.
This network will provide on-going encouragement, support and, more importantly, a framework for the sharing of information about new dementia resources and national and local policy. Through the Community of Practice, health-care professionals will be able to access training and development with dementia experts at the University of Hertfordshire and throughout the clinical environment.
The network comes after over 120 health-care professionals from across the county attended the inaugural Dementia Champions Symposium hosted by the University of Hertfordshire in partnership with the NHS in Hertfordshire and the Alzheimer’s Society. The event was chaired by Alan Farmer, director of workforce at NHS Hertfordshire, and featured a keynote speech from Dr Peter Carter OBE, chief executive and general secretary of the Royal College of Nursing.
Alan Walton, associate dean, School of Health and Human Sciences, University of Hertfordshire said: “Dementia is a common progressive condition that doesn’t just affect older people; people affected by this are getting younger. We need to change the public perception of dementia and, here in Hertfordshire, our new dementia champions’ network will help members to provide sustained improvement in the quality of diagnosis, treatment and care for those living with dementia.”
This recent one-day symposium brought together professionals working in the dementia support field just days before the government announced extra funding for research into dementia to tackle the UK’s national crisis in care – doubling the dementia research budget to £66 m by 2015. Dementia affects about 750,000 people in the UK with a cost to society estimated at £23 bn; and the number affected is projected to rise to 940,000 by 2021. Across Hertfordshire, there are almost 6,000 out of a possible 12,600 diagnosed with dementia, and this figure is expected to rise to almost 18,000 by 2015.
For more information, please contact Julie Cooper, University of Hertfordshire Press Office on 01707 284095, Email: j.cooper5@herts.ac.uk
Notes to Editor
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