LIVING WITH DEMENTIA
Many families who contact Otus Live-in Care are seeking support for a loved one who is living with dementia. So often the request to the Otus team is ‘how can we keep our loved one safe, allow them to maintain their independence and dignity, but remain living in their own home?’.
We are proud to say that we have been successfully helping families all over the UK do just this for over 10 years now – introducing carefully selected, experienced live-in carers to provide one-to-one care for our clients in their own home.
Currently it is estimated that over 944,000 people in the UK live with dementia and this is predicted to rise to 1 million by 2030.* Living with dementia is not just about the person who has been diagnosed – it also about that person’s loved ones who may be in a caring role or simply just in need of some help and advice.
There are many reference books available offering help and advice for families in this situation and one of the best ones Otus recommends is by Oliver James entitled ‘Contented Dementia’. It’s available from all good bookshops and online.
Last month, we shared some information issued by Alzheimer’s UK aimed at helping families cope during the festive period. Dementia UK is another charity offering very sound advice for those living with dementia. They recently launched a short video entitled ‘We live with dementia’. It’s available to view on YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRAzcrsRDvk – the short film shines a spotlight on the stories of three families navigating life with dementia. It’s a powerful reminder that the condition doesn’t just affect the person with the diagnosis − everyone around them is affected too. The Dementia UK website also offers a lot of helpful advice – https://www.dementiauk.org/information-and-support/living-with-dementia.
Whether you have an immediate need or are just thinking about future planning around the care for a loved one, there are many resources available online. But if you would like to speak to someone in person, we are all ‘Dementia Friends’ and would be happy share any help and advice we can, without obligation. Our telephone number is 01403 710119.
*Research conducted by Bournemouth University, published in the Homecare Association Journal, December 2023