Dementia Friends
This week we were lucky enough to have Sally Wilse (owner of Seniors Helping Seniors UK) deliver a Dementia Friends information session.
Sally, a Dementia Friend champion, presented the session to 20 staff members and they all became Dementia Friends.
The Alzheimer’s Society’s Dementia Friends Programme is an initiative to change people’s perceptions of Dementia. It aims to transform the way the nation thinks, acts and talks about the condition.
A Dementia Friend is someone who has learned the key messages about dementia, a little bit about what it is like to live with dementia and they volunteer to turn their understanding into practical action.
During October 2019, 19,654 new Dementia Friends were made through information sessions and the 3 million Dementia Friend Milestone has been reached nationwide.
One in fourteen people over the age of 65 in the UK, are currently living with Dementia, so most people will come into contact with the disease, for which there is yet no cure.
Seniors Helping Seniors UK is an in-home elderly care group that employs active older people to care for people who need support. Sally says “Kings is a very special resource in our community and we have always found that the team does everything they can to support all conditions. Running a Dementia Friends information session in the workplace can make it easier for people to volunteer their time and I was delighted with the turnout. Running these sessions is always fulfilling for me because I see each one as a huge step closer to providing the support people, living with dementia and their families need. The team at Kings were keen and enthusiastic and I’m grateful to the management and staff who attended”.
