Alzheimer's Society comment on a review of palliative care published in the May issue of Journal of Clinical Nursing
Published 12 May 2008
One in three people over 65 will die with dementia and too many of them are subjected to an undignified and unnecessarily painful death.
This is often because staff lack the specialist training to provide good care at the end of someone's life. It is vital that all people, not just those with cancer, benefit from good palliative care.
The number of people living with dementia in the UK is set to soar to more than a million in less than twenty years. This important review highlights the desperate need for specialist palliative care for those in the final stages of dementia. There must be more sharing of skills and knowledge between dementia care and palliative care specialists to enable this to happen.
The state of dementia care now has been compared to that of cancer care in the 1950s; people are afraid of dementia; many people do not receive a proper diagnosis; there is poor access to treatments and a lack of good quality care. The time for change is now. The first National Dementia Strategy, due to be published in draft next month, must tackle the appalling state of end of life dementia care.
Clive Evers
Director of Knowledge Management
