Dementia Advisers Survey

Ipsos was commissioned by Age UK on behalf of the Department of Health to undertake a survey into the provision of dementia adviser services across England.

Dementia advisers provide a single identifiable point of contact for people with dementia and their carers following a diagnosis. They have knowledge of and direct access to the whole range of available local services, providing advice, information about where to get care and enabling contact with other services. The aim of this research was to explore the provision of services available to older people, with particular reference to dementia adviser services throughout England. To achieve this, those responsible for commissioning dementia adviser services within Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) and Local Authorities (LAs), were invited to complete an online survey in October/November 2015.

A number of key findings emerge from the research, including:

• Various services for older people are widely available across England. Dementia adviser services were found in most of the areas that responded and had often been long established in those areas.
• Around half (47%) of the commissioners that responded jointly commission dementia adviser services with other CCGs/LAs. This suggests that dementia services are becoming integrated across England.
• In the majority of cases, commissioners report that dementia advisers communicate face-to-face or over the telephone with people with dementia and their carers.
• Commissioners report that dementia advisers communicate with a variety of people and organisations on behalf of the people they support, most frequently memory clinic staff, community social services, support groups and community health services.

Technical details

The findings from this research are based on an online survey with 89 commissioners of dementia services within CCGs/LAs throughout England. Taking joint commissioning into account, the survey covered 141 CCGs/LAs. Fieldwork was undertaken in 2nd October – 27th November 2015. Survey results are unweighted. Prior to conducting the fieldwork, Ipsos conducted cognitive interviews with commissioners of dementia services to aid the questionnaire design. Full details are available in the report.