JOINT DEMENTIA STRATEGY - CAN YOU HELP?
We would like to involve as many carers of people with dementia as possible in the implementation of our new strategy. This will help us to ensure that we get the design, location and publicity of new services right. It will help us to understand why so many people with dementia do not come forward for diagnosis and how we can increase understanding of the condition and how to seek help.
Dementia is a condition affecting the brain and can lead to loss of memory and changes to personality. The most common form of dementia is Alzheimer’s disease and it mostly affects people over 65.
The strategy aims
- to increase the identification and early diagnosis of people with dementia;
- to improve support to carers and people close to someone with dementia;
- to provide people with dementia and their carers with more choice and control over their care and support.
A new memory assessment service is being planned to help with diagnosis. It will be supported by a single care pathway which can be followed by GPs, professionals and the public as they contact services for help. We want to raise awareness of dementia to improve understanding of the condition and combat the stigma which is often a deterrent to seeking help.
Finally we want to raise knowledge of the condition amongst the health and social care workforce to improve their response to people dementia.
If you are interested in helping us please contact:
Chris Hume, Project Manager, Dementia, NHS Kensington and Chelsea This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or phone 07532 101586
Kensington & Chelsea Local Involvement Network (K&C LINk) Recruitment
We are currently advertising for a part-time (average of 21 hours per week) LINk Development Officer at the K&C LINk Office in Ladbroke Grove. For further information and to apply online please see: https://recruit.hestia.org/wrl/pages/vacancy.jsf?search=2
Starting salary: £15,663 per annum (inc. London weighting)
Pension: 5% of basic salary
Holidays: 105 hours per year, plus 33.6 public holidays
The closing date is June 13th and interviews will be held on June 18th 2010.
Should you require any further information, please contact Paula Murphy, the K&C LINk Co-ordinator on ph: 020 8968 6771 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Medics can speak a strange language!
Lovers of plain English would have delighted in being a fly on the wall last week. Sitting in a Church office in Kensington, three of us from the local LINk were sitting disecting the latest QA (Quality Assessment) Reports from our local hospitals. Faced with a jungle of NHS-speak, we suddenly realised we had the power to fling these back and ask for them to be written in plain English -so we did. On the way we also mentioned that, try as we would, we hadn’t been able to find explanations for increase/decrease in use of mixed wards, and other subjects dear to patients’ hearts.
This gave us a wonderful feeling of power – which was increased when all three hospitals sent back a message thanking us for our participation! But it remains to see if they have got the message when QAs come out next year.
One of our group made a list of some of the more weird words in the QAs, which included:
“cohort” – the scholars amongst us thought these were Roman soldiers
“symbiotic monitoring system” “synbiotix database” – we spent some time trying to work out if it were the same – then gave up.
“clinical champion” – this is awful NHS-speak that thinks if you give someone a nice name that will make them feel better
We are still puzzling over the meaning of “the prevention of VTE is a national target and is a national CQUIN” “.
and/ “planned protocolised care pathways for example using the enhanced recovery programme methods”. Er – what?
So it went on. And these QAs are supposed to be to help the public understand how their local hospital has performed – or not, as the case might be. But who will know, or understand? Or are these learned paragraphs designed to fudge the issues so we can’t understand? Or show off the fact that someone studied Latin at school?
N.B. watch out if you ever see STAR-PUs on your notes. Apparently it means
‘Specific therapeutic group age-sex prescribing units’.
Can’t wait to have that come up at a meeting, and ask all the PPs (pompous professors) the meaning of this phrase!
I asked to hear more explanations about NHS-speak, and back came this reply from a very senior person. Unlike the NHS, I do mean it when I say something – so have protected their anonymity :
My personal horrors are “people we serve” which generally means the opposite.
“Challenging” is another which just means “more difficult”. “Mission statements” concept and content – should be banned in my view.
In fact, the more one thinks of words the more there is a general rule that the meaning in the NHS is the opposite of the real world e.g. “consultation” “involvement” “choice” and of course “complaints”
Cynically yours!
And in my view, they are spot on!
(Extracted from 'Why can't the NHS speak plain English?')
Dignity Champions Update - May 2010
Hi Everyone,
Well this has been a really busy month for all 570+ members of K&C LINk, but particularly so for the LINk 'Dignity Champions.' After the delight and gratitude with our success sunk in, we ran an induction training course for interested members on the concept of 'dignity champions.' We ran through the 'dignity in care' campaign, the underpinning principles and our priorities in K&C namely nutrition and safeguarding.
Following on from the induction session, our helpful strategic partners in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea ran a safeguarding session for our 'Champions' and Central London Community Healthcare ran a similar session for us on nutrition.
We also had really helpful meetings, with thanks again to support from RBKC and CLCH, with possible pilot sites for both projects.
It ws then time for all the 'champions' to sit down and start drafting the assessment process for the sites. We are now inviting comment on these drafts...so if you would like to give us feedback on a dignity assessment for nutrition or for safeguarding please do get in touch!
Be in touch next month with the updated drafts and hopefully some dates for the pilot assessments!
Happy Friday,
The Dignity Champions
For K&C LINk