Dementia Action Week: The future of dementia support will be built in communities, as well as in health and social care
Dementia research has advanced enormously over the past decade, bringing fresh hope to people living with dementia as well as the families and carers who support them every day.
However, Dementia Action Week serves as a timely reminder that while medical progress remains vital, it is increasingly clear that the future of dementia support is also being shaped in our local communities.
The Dementia Trust has spent almost 40 years working alongside people living with dementia, their carers and the professionals who support them. Throughout that time, one thing has remained consistently clear, living well with dementia depends as much on relationships and inclusion as it does on clinical treatments.
Across Scotland and beyond, grassroots projects are transforming what dementia support can look like. In community halls, theatres and libraries, people are creating unique and powerful experiences that can really make an extraordinary difference to someone’s life.
Through our Disruption Awards programme, we have supported projects that challenge traditional approaches to dementia care and are making a disruptive difference to lives across the country.
One recent example is Tide’s peer support network for people living with young onset dementia and their carers in Merseyside. By creating accessible weekend support groups in Liverpool Central Library, the project has provided an opportunity for people to connect at weekends, which can often be the loneliest days of the week for many carers.
We have also supported participatory arts projects that use creativity to reduce isolation and help people express themselves beyond a diagnosis. Chichester Festival Theatre’s “(B)old” project focused particularly on older men and people from global majority communities who can often face additional barriers to support and engagement. The results have been really remarkable, with workshops boosting wellbeing by almost 50% among participants and carers.
In Fife, another project has shown how simple moments of joy can help reconnect people in profound ways. Every Monday, laughter, singing and dancing now fill Elmview Ward through the ReConnect project, a partnership between NHS Fife, Fife Health and Social Care Partnership and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, supported by Dementia Trust. Professional musicians bring live music directly onto the ward, creating moments for patients and their loved ones to come together and reconnect.
These projects may not make national headlines in the same way as scientific breakthroughs, but their impact is deeply human. Reminding us that dementia support is not only about treatment but about creating joy and belonging.
As the number of people living with dementia continues to rise, we need to build more communities with compassion and understanding. The strongest future for dementia care will come when health services, charities and local organisations work hand in hand.
We should absolutely continue striving for medical breakthroughs, but we must never lose sight of the fact that quality of life is also shaped every day in those magic little moments of human connection.
