Julie Allen & Sharon Sheldrick
We both come from a mental health background and have years of experience in care. Our job title is Dementia Care Associate Practitioner. Julie is based at Eastbourne and Sharon is based at Conquest. Both sites are acute hospitals with on average 150 patients with either dementia, cognitive impairment or delirium.
The Dementia Care Team supports people with these needs during their hospital stay. We provide assessment and care-planning advice for in-patients, support the patient during their hospital stay, provide support for their families, telephone advice, onward referral and signposting.
Speaker Session Title: Dementia Champions
We created the dementia champions with the view of each ward having an advocate for dementia patients. The champions are a role model in their teams. They are supported to promote the best ways to implement person centred care for patients with a cognitive impairment, Delirium or Dementia. They also make sure that all staff that work within their area are competent with the Butterfly Scheme which is used trust wide.
We want our Dementia Champions to feel empowered in their role so regular support is vital. We have bi-monthly meet ups via teams, and we have our own Teams channel and WhatsApp group. The Champions meet twice a year face to face where they are provided with relevant training, information updates, and new topics which may arise following meetings that we have had.
Our vision of Dementia Champions was to form a group of people that may have an interest in Dementia. Our meetings do not follow a textbook but is a space to resolve day to day problems that ward staff may encounter. The Dementia Champions also help with raising money in dementia action week and Alzheimer’s month so we are able to buy activities for patients to relieve the unmet need of boredom.
