Project 11: Looking back to inform more equitable, future care – survey of older people’s mental health and memory services in England: service configurations and reconfigurations over last decade 

Background:

The diagnosis and aftercare of dementia in England are primarily managed by a network of locally commissioned memory services, which have grown since the implementation of the National Dementia Strategy in 2009. However, there is limited understanding of the growth, coverage, and activities of these services, which makes it harder to develop effective dementia policies and put them into practice. There are also concerns about the ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on these services and whether there is a ‘postcode lottery’ in who can access them. 

Aims and objectives:

We want to gather comprehensive data about memory services across England so that we can inform policy decisions about how they should be structured and funded in the future. We want to understand how these services have changed over the past decade and develop a system to group them according to the types of services they provide. Once we have this information, we will compare service availability with dementia diagnosis rates in specific local areas. Once we have developed a system to gather and analyse this data for dementia services, we will explore whether a similar system could be set up for other neurodegenerative diseases.  

Methods:

We will start by working with Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCPsych) and others to compile contacts in memory services and older people’s mental health services. We will work with service providers, patients and the public to develop two surveys: one for memory services and one for older people’s mental health services. We will bring together the results of both surveys and analyse them to create a model of service availability, funding and change over time. We will also write in depth case studies of individual services.  By working with key stakeholders, we hope to reach services across England.  

Policy relevance and dissemination:

Our findings will help policymakers to develop policies about dementia services and put them into practice. By looking at how existing services are structured, our research could also inform the design of future services for people with dementia.  
 
We will create a clear, concise summary of the key conclusions from the research that can be shared with a wide variety of stakeholders. This will include policymakers and clinicians, as well as policy networks and charities that represent older people (such as Age UK and the Alzheimer’s Society). As well as publishing our findings in academic journals, we will talk to individual stakeholders to help put our findings into practice.