Our campaigns
Please visit our new website nationaldementiaaction.org.uk where you can find updated information on all of our campaigns.
In partnership with our members, we campaign on major issues within health and social care, to ensure people affected by dementia and those that care for them have the best possible experience accessing services. Each campaign seeks to bring about large scale change across the health and social care sector.
Recent campaigns are highlighted below, and you can find out more through the links in the left-hand sidebar or by contacting ndaa@alzheimers.org.uk
Dementia Friendly Hospitals
Working with clinicians, people living with dementia, their carers, and policy-makers, we created a Dementia-Friendly Hospital Charter. In 2015, 164 acute and non-acute trusts made a commitment to becoming dementia friendly, with 88 submitting Action Plans and joining Dementia Action Alliance.
The Charter improves five key areas:
- The environment in which care is given
- The knowledge, skills and attitudes of the workforce
- The ability to identify and assess cognitive impairment
- The ability to support people with dementia to be discharged back home
- The use of a person-centered care plan which involves families and carers.
Dementia Action Alliance Hospitals frequently tell us that the Charter has opened them up to a network of likeminded health and social care professionals, whom they engage with regularly. They are committed to reducing readmission rates, preventing over 6000 falls across the country, and reducing the mortality rate of people with dementia in acute care.
Find out more about the Dementia Friendly Hospitals Charter, and how you can join.
From Seldom Heard to Seen and Heard
In autumn 2017, the Dementia Action Alliance launched ‘From Seldom Heard to Seen & Heard’, a campaign bringing DAA members together for improved outcomes for people living with dementia and their carers who come from seldom heard groups. These communities include:
- Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender + (LGBT)
- Black, Asian, Minority Ethnic (BAME) communities
- Young onset dementia
- Prison population
- People living in rural communities
- People with learning disabilities
These are examples, however there are many more seldom heard groups we hope to support through this campaign.
Dementia Words Matter
Dementia Words Matter is a guide written by DEEP, who are people with dementia seeking to tackle the sensationalist language used to describe living with dementia, such as ‘demented’, ‘sufferer’, ‘senile’ and ‘living death.’ In partnership with Dementia Action Alliance members, this campaign acknowledged that these words create stereotypes, and give the impression that it is not possible to live well with dementia.
This guide asks people to commit to the three ‘C’s:
- Check words and descriptions used in your printed materials against the DEEP Guide
- Change any words and descriptions that people with dementia have identified as ones to avoid
- Challenge words which you recognise as inappropriate - in newspapers, on TV, on websites and in conferences and meetings.
Members continue to promote the work of this campaign on social media via #dementiawords.
