Living with dementia magazine March 2011

An awareness campaign to encourage more people to recognise the symptoms of dementia and visit their GP if they are worried gets underway this month.

Alzheimer's Society is working in partnership with the Department of Health on an advertising campaign to raise awareness of the symptoms of dementia. The aim is to encourage more people to visit their GP if they are worried about memory loss. The sooner people are diagnosed with dementia, the earlier they can get help, treatment and support to enable them to live as well as they possibly can. Currently, two thirds of people with dementia never receive an official diagnosis.

The campaign will be piloted in Yorkshire and Humberside and the North West for the whole of March. The message will be, 'If you are worried about the memory loss of someone close to you, talk to them about visiting their GP.' The campaign will mainly be aimed at children of older people, particularly daughters, who may have noticed behavioural changes in their parent, as well as the spouse or partner of the person themselves.
Advertising will appear on TV, radio, in the press and online.

One couple's experience

Frances Campbell cares for her husband, Callum, 69, who has vascular dementia. It took a long time to realise that something serious was wrong with Callum when his behaviour started to change.

Frances said,

'With hindsight it was totally clear that Callum had dementia, but none of us realised it. We just thought he was being awkward. It was incredible really that none of the family picked up on it. He was forgetting things a lot, making mistakes with driving and being very inconsiderate. He was saying inappropriate things to the neighbours and they started to fall out with us because of the way Callum was behaving.

'It got to the stage when I didn't want to go out because I didn't know what he was going to say to people. Eventually our sons started saying, "We need to get this looked at, dad needs to go to the doctors." We finally got him there, and that achievement was more down to the children persuading us really.'

When Callum was diagnosed, the family could finally make sense of his behaviour. Frances says,

'All the stress of wondering what was wrong went away overnight. But it never crossed my mind that it would be dementia.'

Unlike thousands of people who receive little or no information following a diagnosis of dementia, the Campbells have nothing but praise for the services to which they were signposted. Frances says,

'After the diagnosis, everything fell into place. It set the ball rolling for Alzheimer's Society to come and talk to us about things. They have been fantastic, a real lifeline. We got the support we needed from the surgery, social services have been very good to us, carers come to help us out, and Callum goes to a day centre. There's a whole list of people who have supported us. And the support groups we go to make things much easier.'

Frances believes a campaign is desperately needed to raise awareness of dementia among the public.
She says,

'We should have taken Callum to see the doctor a lot earlier. I was totally unaware of dementia, it genuinely did not occur to me. I think people need to be much more aware of the symptoms. I didn't understand that for someone who was articulate and educated, dementia was something that could happen to them.'

Symptoms to look out for

The symptoms of dementia include loss of memory, mood changes and confusion. Dementia affects everyone in different ways, but it is important to seek help if your memory is not what it used to be. Some symptoms include:

• struggling to remember recent events, but easily recalling things that happened in the past

• finding it difficult to follow conversations or programmes on TV

• forgetting the names of friends or everyday objects

• noticing that you repeat yourself or lose the thread of what you are saying

• having problems thinking and reasoning

• feeling anxious, depressed or angry about your forgetfulness.

Facts about dementia

There are 750,000 people with dementia in the UK. In ten years, there will be over 940,000 people living with dementia.  By 2025, there will be over a million people with the condition. One in three people over 65 will die with dementia.

Alzheimer's disease is the most common type of dementia, affecting 62 per cent of those diagnosed.