Poor care for UK dementia patients draws fire

A new study in the UK has slammed the country’s social and health services for leaving 75% of British dementia patients at the mercy of friends and family for care.

The survey by the Alzheimer's Society spoke to more than a thousand family doctors and found they were not keen on referring people suffering from suspected dementia if they thought support services were not in place.

The Alzheimer’s Society chief executive, Jeremy Hughes, said: “Our survey gives a stark view from the doctor’s surgery of people with dementia left struggling in the aftermath of a diagnosis. People can need a lot of help to live well with dementia. Families and friends are a vital source of support but they mustn’t be relied on to do everything. As dementia takes hold, people with dementia and their carers look to statutory services to give them the backup they desperately need to cope.”

The number of people suffering with the illness is currently 850,000, but that is expected to rise to more than one million by the year 2021 and double to two million by the year 2051.

Now the National Health Service (NHS) is being criticized, with more than half of the doctors in the latest survey thinking the NHS has failed to do enough to help care for people suffering with the debilitating illness.

Cuts to funding in the local authority means many suffering in the country are not getting the care they need.

The deputy chair of the British Medical Association's General Practitioners’ (GP) committee, Richard Vautrey believes, “GPs are increasingly frustrated that due to excessive cuts to local authority funding, some of the most vulnerable people in our society are not receiving the level of care and support they deserve. The increasing emphasis on diagnosing dementia has not been matched with proper services for patients once they are diagnosed.”

The Alzheimer's Society is now calling for all those diagnosed with dementia to have someone advise them on their illness and a single point of contact to help carers.

MW/GHN

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