Agenda item

This report provides information on population statistics, the current dementia diagnosis rate in Medway and development plans that are being undertaken to support the achievement of the national directive to achieve 66.6% diagnosis rate of the predicted prevalence. The report also provides information on the Ageing Well dementia transformation plan to develop community-based memory assessment services working in collaboration with KMPT specialist memory assessment services.

Discussion:

The Deputy Director Out of Hospital Care (Community Services) and the Dementia Clinical Lead from NHS Kent & Medway introduced the report which provided information on population statistics, the current dementia diagnosis rate in Medway and development plans that were being undertaken to support the achievement of the national directive to achieve 66.6% diagnosis rate of the predicted prevalence. It was explained that, in agreement with NHS England, an interim target of 63% diagnosis rate by March 2025 had been set and that there had been significant improvement in the rate since April 2024. Jointly funded Dementia Co-ordinators had been introduced to become the primary contact for patients and carers and to ensure co-ordinated services were wrapped around the patient and their families. 

Members then raised a number of questions and comments, which included:

• Diagnosis rate – in response to a comment that, although the improvement was welcomed, the rate of diagnosis remained at an unacceptable level, it was acknowledged that more work was needed but that following a long period of static or reducing rates of diagnosis, the marked improvement was a positive sign that the work being implemented was making a positive impact.
• Dementia co-ordinators – in response to a question about how many Dementia Co-ordinators existed, it was explained that there was 1 per Primary Care Network (PCN).  Reference was made to an evaluation of feedback received about post diagnostic support both before and after the introduction of Dementia Co-ordinators and it was undertaken to circulate this to the Committee.
• Reliance on GPs – concern was raised that there was a reliance on upskilling GPs to carry out assessments, despite the level of GPs per population being low in Medway.  In response, comment was made that in many cases, dementia was preventable and that therefore there was more to be done as a society to empower people to keep well and live healthy lives, as well as building age friendly communities. It was added that diagnosing patients in the community, with not just GPs but a combination of wider health care professionals to be able to look at the whole person, had shown to improve diagnosis rates and also led to improved management of the condition.
• Infrastructure – reference was made to the infrastructure needed, across the system to make Medway dementia friendly and how leaders were working jointly across organisations.  In response it was clarified that there was a system wide dementia oversight partnership board in place, chaired by the clinical lead for dementia to work collectively on improvements system wide.

Decision:

a)    The Committee noted the contents of the report and that in August 2024 Medway achieved a significant improvement in the dementia diagnosis rate to 61.4%.

b)    The Committee requested information about Dementia Co-ordinators, in terms of numbers and the outcome of the evaluation relating to patient experience since their introduction.

c)    The Committee requested information about the ongoing impact and implementation of the recommendations from the Task Group that looked into Dementia Friendly Medway in 2017.