This pack contains a selection of quality assured awareness raising resources designed to promote living well with dementia. The resources include leaflets, factsheets, contact lists and a DVD.

The pack is intended for hospital care staff for use with people coming into hospital who may have dementia or experience symptoms associated with dementia. The pack contains specific examples and also signposts people to the organisations themselves. Although the pack is designed for use in a hospital setting there is clearly scope for it to be further developed for use in other settings.

The pack has been produced to support the implementation of the South West Hospital Standards in Dementia Care, intended to transform hospital care for people with a dementia.

The implementation of the hospital standards intends to make a significant contribution to improving care and services in general and community hospitals. The provision of a resource pack will provide accessible information in the format that is suitable, appropriate and can be tailored for people living with dementia.

A recent survey illustrated the need for a core information pack, which could be provided to people in all South West hospital settings. We found that many hospitals were promoting the use of nationally recognised resources, such as the ‘This is me leaflet’ (Alzheimer’s Society, 2010). However some hospitals do not signpost people consistently to the most valued resources and remain unaware of the wealth of awareness resources which exist. We also identified excellent examples of local handbooks and signposting guides. A few of these are well known and have been adapted for use in other localities. However there remain a number of hidden gems, which many could benefit from knowing more about.

We are working with South West hospitals to encourage staff to adopt and adapt the dementia awareness resource pack making it relevant for local use. The initial promotion drive will coincide with Dementia Awareness Week 3-9 July 2011.

Important messages from the research into the lived experience of people living with dementia, their carers, families and friends, includes:

• every person’s journey with dementia is unique
• people would like information tailored to their requirements at that time
• people want to be signposted and supported to information and resources
• sometimes people need support to understand and access what is on offer, and
• a key point of contact can make a real difference.