Plugging the dementia gap

Moves are underway in Coventry and Warwickshire to challenge misconceptions about dementia and to provide quality support and services to dementia sufferers.

The Living Well with Dementia Partnership is surveying individuals to check their awareness and understanding of the condition. Findings will be used to identify gaps in knowledge and services, and to make improvements.

Survey questions range from knowing what to do to reduce the risk of getting dementia and what support is available, to identifying signs and symptoms.

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Revealing innovative solutions

Five innovative solutions have been developed to help people living with dementia, following an invitation from the Design Council in partnership with the Department of Health, to create products and services that make life easier and more enjoyable for people with the condition and their carers.

The solutions focus on and around the point of diagnosis, with the aim of being preventative measures that improve the quality of life in the early stages of the disease. They are:

• Trading Times, an online service that matches carers with local businesses for flexible paid work.  The Trading Times website will have a full range of tools and templates to assist both carers and employers.       
• Ode, a fragrance release system designed to stimulate appetite among people with dementia.  The mains powered unit releases three food fragrances a day, and is adjustable to coincide with the user’s mealtimes.
• Grouple, a secure private online social network helping people share the responsibilities of caring for someone with dementia.  
• Dementia Dog, a service providing assistance dogs to people with dementia, helping them lead more fulfilled, independent and stress free lives. 
• Buddi, a wristband personal alarm that people will be happy to wear and can send alerts from anywhere to Buddi’s support services. 

The teams behind the solutions won a share of £360,000 plus professional support to help them develop their ideas.

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Fall detectors first phase results

Findings from the Fall Detector Project are now available on line, and confirm detectors are more likely to be used and are most effective if they are well designed and suit the needs of the person using them. 

The project is run in partnership between Improvement and Efficiency West Midlands, Coventry University Health Design and Technology Institute, and West Midlands Local Authorities and PCT’s. It is funded by NHS West Midlands Regional Innovation Fund.

It set out to evaluate the use of fall detectors in the region, with the purpose of understanding users’ experiences and improve the allocation and use of the devices.

The project also aims to encourage closer relationships between manufacturers, service users and staff, to bring about better design and reliability. 

The next phase of the project will look at:

• raising awareness of fall detectors within the general public
•  inspiring telecare manufacturers to improve the design of their products
• continuing to spread best practice across the region
• evaluating falls prevention and falls response services throughout the West Midlands.

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JIP e-bulletin No 29 April 2012

Welcome

We are now well into Spring, the season in which the White Paper for social care reform is supposed to be released. Speculation is rife about when it will actually be published and if the issue of funding will be tackled head on.

Recent announcements by the Care Services minister, Paul Burstow, suggest the most we can expect is a White Paper outlining proposals for reform based on responses to the Caring for our future consultation, and a progress report responding to recommendations made in the Dilnot Commission report.

If this is the case, the issue of how we pay for elderly care will remain unresolved for the foreseeable future, and responsibility for making an inadequate system work in the best interest of elderly and vulnerable people, will remain solely with health and social care services.

Alongside this, is the new Health and Social Care Act, which promotes greater integration between the NHS and social care.

Collaboration and integration in commissioning will be required, and it is gratifying to see examples throughout the West Midlands of where health and social care services are ahead of the game. ADASS will continue to support these initiatives and engage with NHS colleagues.


Peter Hay
Strategic Director
Adults and Communities
Birmingham City Council

Falls detection – a user led approach

A report from the West Midland’s fall detector dissemination event held in December 2011, is now available.    

One third of older people who fall lie undetected for at least one hour.

Fall detectors can provide an early alert to a fall, and ensure a timely and appropriate response, but their use varies across the region.

The Health Design & Technology Institute (HDTI), Coventry University in partnership with the West Midlands Region Telehealthcare Network and Warwickshire PCT, were funded by NHS West Midlands to evaluate the use of detectors within the West Midlands Region.

The project captured and analysed users’ experience, and will use the information to improve the way fall detectors are deployed in the region.

The first phase of the project is now complete. The report including presentations from the dissemination event can be found on Coventry University’s website. 

The second phase of the fall detector project is now underway. This will involve spreading best practice and information, as well as evaluating falls prevention and falls response services across the region.

For further information or if you would like to get involved please contact swilliams@westmidlandsiep.gov.uk

Detailed information about fall detectors currently available on the market can be found at the Gadget gateway.





 

Assistive Technology degree courses

Coventry University is inviting applications to take up places on two degree course, designed to improve technical knowledge and expertise in products, service management and research skills.  

The courses – a Foundation Degree in Assistive Technology, and an MSc in Assistive Technology start in September 2012.

See site for details

Local Healthwatch free master classes

Free master classes will be held by the LGA to equip key officers with the tools and techniques needed to set up robust and credible local Healthwatch organisations, the bodies that will hold commissioners and providers of services to account, under the new Health and Social Care Act 2012.

Topics to be covered include:

• Options for procuring Healthwatch
• Working with elected members to deliver success
• Good governance
• Working with local stakeholders
• Developing sound transition plans and ensuring sustainability
• Working productively with Healthwatch England (the national consumer champion)
• Options for developing Healthwarch as a social enterprise.

A free masterclass will be held in Birmingham on Thursday 24 May. See details.