Patients facing wide variation in dementia car, Alzheimer's Society warns

Dementia patients are facing wide variations in quality of care across England, according to new evidence from the Alzheimer's Society.

The Society has said that patients admitted to hospitals in England are playing ‘Russian roulette’ with their health, after a series of freedom of information (FOI) requests found problems with falls and night time discharges and readmissions.

The research found that 25 per cent of people over the age of 65 who fell in hospital had dementia, with 702 people with the condition found to have fallen in just one trust in 2014-15.

The FOI requests also found that a large number of trusts were inappropriately discharging patients at night, with 4,926 people with dementia being discharged between 11pm and 6 am across the 68 trusts that responded to the requests.

The investigation also surveyed over 570 people affected by dementia and found that 92 per cent found hospital environments frightening, 57 per cent said they felt people with dementia were not treated with understanding and dignity in hospital, and only two per cent said that they felt all hospital staff understood the specific needs of people with dementia.

Following these findings the Society is launching the ‘Fix Dementia Care’ campaign, calling on all hospitals to publish an annual statement of dementia care, which includes feedback from patients, helping to raise standards of care across the country. It is also recommending that Monitor and the Care Quality Commission should include standards of dementia care in their assessments.

Jeremy Hughes, chief executive of Alzheimer’s Society, said: “Good dementia care should never be a throw of the dice – yet people are forced to gamble with their health every time they are admitted to hospital.

“Poor care can have devastating, life-changing consequences. Starving because you can’t communicate to hospital staff that you are hungry, or falling and breaking a hip because you’re confused and no-one’s around to help, can affect whether you stand any chance of returning to your own home or not.

“We must urgently put a stop to the culture where it’s easier to find out about your local hospital finances than the quality of care you’ll receive if you have dementia. We are encouraging everyone to get behind our campaign to improve transparency and raise the bar on quality.”