SCIE: Safeguarding adults with dementia during the COVID-19 pandemic

Social Care Institute for Excellence| updated 5 January 2021| Safeguarding adults with dementia during the COVID-19 pandemic

Social Care Institute for Excellence in partnership with the Alzheimer’s Society has published a quick guide to support care providers and staff to safeguard people with dementia during the pandemic. There are increased concerns that, during this time, people may be more vulnerable to abuse or neglect.

This may be a result of:

• increased social isolation
• stress on carers and caring relationships
• overstretched and stressed care staff
• an increase in criminal behaviour (scams etc)
• an increase in domestic abuse
• a range of new contacts (volunteers, those delivering food and medicines).

The guide is available online from SCIE

Dementia and housing

Dementia and Housing | Social Care Institutute for Excellence

image source: https://www.scie.org.uk/

The quality of life for someone living with dementia is affected by where and how they live. The Prime Minister’s Challenge on Dementia 2020 (2015) states that, by 2020 we wish to see an increased number of people with dementia being able to live longer in their own homes when it is in their interests to do so, with a greater focus on independent living.

Two-thirds of people with dementia live in the community in a range of different housing types. Most live in mainstream housing, with a third living on their own.

The British Standards Institute and the Alzheimer’s Society have developed a Code of Practice for the housing sector. It identifies key areas that will help to support people living with dementia. They include:

• adaptations, built environment, design and access to outdoor space
• assistive technologies, including telecare
• training of all staff in the housing sector

Sometimes, simple changes made to an existing property can support the wellbeing and independence of someone with dementia, allowing them to remain in their home for longer, as well as reducing pressures on carers.

This resource from the Social Care Institutute for Excellence (SCIE) contains information and links on the subject of housing.

Full detail: Dementia and Housing | SCIE

Dementia from the inside

What is the video about?

In this film we find out what it might feel like to live with dementia. Viewers will experience a little of what it is like to find yourself in a world that seems familiar and yet doesn’t always make sense. The incidents pictured in this film and memories recounted are based upon true experiences gathered from people living with dementia

Messages for practice

People with dementia:

May interpret things that happen differently to those around them
May have unanticipated periods of lucidity and periods of confusion alike
May sometimes not recognise people or places they know well
May become frustrated with themselves or those who struggle to understand them
May not be able to articulate or communicate their anxieties, fears or frustrations
Live with unpredictability, such as the passage of time

via SCIE: Dementia from the inside.