As part of Dementia Awareness Week, Touchstone (in partnership wit the Reginald Centre and Feel Good Factor) is organising a dementia information event for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities on Thursday 18th May. We'll be at the Reginald Centre on Chapeltown Road in Leeds from 9:30am to 1pm. Join us at this free information event and hear from: Tim Sanders, Integrated Commissioning and Transformation Manager, Dementia, NHS Leeds Clinical
A woman in her 70s approached the dementia worker following a talk at a local women’s group, sharing her concerns of having similar symptoms for the last few months. She was advised to contact her GP and advised to ask for a memory test if she felt that her memory loss was not a part of her normal ageing process. As well as contact details for the BME Dementia Service, she was also given a fact sheet on ‘How the GP
Ripal from Touchstone's BME Dementia Service will be giving a presentation on Dementia Within BME Communities at the UK Dementia Congress, to be held in Brighton in 1-3 November: "the largest annual multi-disciplinary dementia-focused event and exhibition in the UK and the best opportunity for professionals to learn from and be inspired by others’ experience, make connections and build bridges towards best practice in their own localities". Key speakers at
West Yorkshire Playhouse have just launched a guide for use by other theatres and touring companies on how to adapt shows to be more suitable for audiences who are living with dementia. The guide covers areas such as use of language, making the case for dementia friendly performances, knowing your audience and running creative sessions with audience members. Members of Touchstone's Hamaari Yadein dementia cafe have attended and enjoyed dementia
In the fourth of our posts for Dementia Awareness Week 2016, Jane Mackay from Kirklees Advocacy Service talks about the steps her team have made to be supportive of people living with dementia and why it's so important to her. Like most other people, my family has had experience of dementia, my Gran first and then my step-Gran, both within a relatively short space of time a few
In our third blog post for Dementia Awareness Week 2016, Amina Ditta talks about her role as a Dementia Champion within one of Touchstone's staff teams. As a Dementia Champion I have been trying to deliver Dementia Awareness sessions to the team at Kirklees. This has proven to be much more challenging that I initially anticipated. Colleagues conduct a variety of role where they are out in the community
In the second of our blog posts for Dementia Awareness Week 2016, a carer talks about his family's experiences from the time of their father's diagnosis with dementia to the time of his death. My father was diagnosed with Dementia/Alzheimer in 2001, we as a family didn't really know what this meant. Our beloved father passed away 5 years ago. Before the diagnosis, both the doctors and us thought dad
In the first of a series of posts from staff and service users for Dementia Awareness Week 2016, Touchstone's Arfan Hanif talks about the Dementia Champions group within the organisation. In 2015 Touchstone, as part of its ‘Working to become Dementia Friendly’ accreditation, set up the Dementia Champions group which represents staff from all of our sites. The Champions have started to play a critical role in terms of
To mark World Alzheimer's Day (21st September), Ripaljeet Kaur has provided this case study of one of the clients supported by Touchstone's BME Dementia Service Mrs B was referred into the service by another organisation. She lives with her daughter-in-law, who is her full time carer, as well as her son and grandson. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2005 and never accessed any support since then. She is very
Touchstone's Kirklees services are now part of the Kirklees Dementia Action Alliance. This means that we are making definite commitments as to how to make our services more appropriate and accessible for people living with dementia. Our action plan is published on the Dementia Action website. Current actions (August 2015) are: Improve our understanding of Dementia We will ensure all of our staff have received appropriate Dementia Awareness training. We