A question we are often asked is ‘Do we cater for people with dementia’? The answer is generally yes – However: We are registered for 16 beds but within that 16 we can accept up to 5 people with early stage dementia but, like every other prospective resident we have to do an assessment prior to admission.
As dementia is a progressive desease it is possible, and I stress possible, that we may have to ask for the resident to move to a more specialist unit should the problems caused by the dementia become beyond our capability. I can state that since we took over St Anthony’s in 2002 we have had to move on only 3 people to a specialist unit or nursing home. It would be wrong of me in this short article to say what we think we can or cannot do as every person is an individual and dementia will affect different people differently.
The individual assessment, combined with reports from doctors, community nurses, hospitals and community psychiatric nurses, is our benchmark on which our decissions are made.