Applause For National Dementia Strategy From Actress June Brown MBE, UK

Main Category: Alzheimer's / Dementia
Article Date: 10 Feb 2009 - 2:00 PDT

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The Lewy Body Society heartily welcomes the publication of the Government's National Dementia Strategy , published last week, for which £150 million has been earmarked for dementia care over the next two years.

Measures to be undertaken include the appointment of a senior clinician in every hospital and care home in England, who will be responsible for seeing that the needs of dementia sufferers are met. Memory clinics will be established in every town and GPs will receive special training to ensure early diagnosis. At present, it takes about three years for a sufferer to be diagnosed with dementia and only about one-third of all patients receive a proper diagnosis. At present there are approximately 700,000 people in the UK with some form of dementia. It is projected that within a generation these numbers will rise to at least 1.4 million people and an annual cost to the economy of £50 billion. The Government hopes that these measures will ultimately save £1 billion a year.

Actress June Brown MBE ("Dot" on BBC's EastEnders ) whose late husband, the actor, Bob Arnold, was suffering from Dementia with Lewy bodies when he died in 2003, is Patron of the Lewy Body Society. She applauded the publication of the National Strategy. " We were fortunate that Bob was diagnosed early so we had the benefit of understanding how the symptoms and behaviour differ from Alzheimer's disease. It is encouraging to know that more people and their families and carers will get essential, early help in learning how to deal with the difficult journey of coping with this terrible disease and ensuring that people receive the proper care and information necessary to maintain a dignified quality of life."

The Strategy aims to improve dementia services over three key areas: increased awareness, earlier diagnosis and treatment and higher quality of care. These are all areas of major concern to the Lewy Body Society (registered charity 1114579) , which was established in 2006 with the objects of raising awareness about Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) and supporting research into the disease. Virtually unknown but not uncommon, Dementia with Lewy bodies is thought to be the second most common form of age-related neuro-degenerative dementia after Alzheimer's. Lewy bodies are microscopic protein deposits in the brain (discovered by Dr Friedrich Lewy in 1912) associated with the death of brain cells. Lewy bodies are also associated with Parkinson's disease and DLB features Parkinson-like motor symptoms as well as mental symptoms similar to Alzheimers. People with DLB also characteristically experience vivid hallucinations and extreme swings of consciousness.

Accurate diagnosis is essential for successful management of the disease. People with DLB are often extremely sensitive to drugs and the wrong medications can be very dangerous.

Lewy Body Society President, Professor Ian McKeith who is Clinical Director of the Institute for Ageing at Health at Newcastle University also welcomed the new proposals. He said "This is a great opportunity to improve the prospects of getting an accurate diagnosis of what is causing dementia in each and every person affected. DLB, Alzheimer's disease and other types of dementia all require different types of treatment and care - the first vital step for all concerned is knowing what they are dealing with."

The Lewy Body Society was founded by barrister Ashley Bayston after her mother was diagnosed with DLB and she discovered that there was no charity in the UK in aid of the disease. It is the only organisation in all of Europe dedicated solely to DLB and has supporters from all over the world. "With the publication of the National Strategy and Sir Terry Pratchett's excellent television programme, it has been a great week for dementia awareness, " It is important that information about dementia includes the fact that although Alzheimer's accounts for more than half of diagnoses of dementia, it is not the only form. The more people who know, the fewer people who suffer."

For further information on Dementia with Lewy bodies and the Lewy Body Society, please visit http://www.lewybody.org

Lewy Body Society

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