New dementia strategy for Scotland: Everyone's Story
The new Dementia Strategy for Scotland is a 10-year vision for change. This strategy was developed in collaboration with people with lived experience and our wider partners. It is the culmination of eight months of engagement with people across Scotland, focussed on how we improve delivery
The Investment
We will begin to implement this strategy in a very challenging fiscal context. While spend on dementia across Scotland has increased steadily over recent years by approximately 13% since 2014, with additional, ring-fenced national investment in frontline dementia services from 2021, we know that more people with dementia (and with other health conditions) want to continue to live safely and well in their own communities for as long as possible.
This means not only maximising the impact of ‘upstream’ investment in areas like community and post-diagnostic support (PDS) so that more people with dementia and their families are able to plan earlier and have more options. It also means continuing to minimise as far as possible unnecessary acute hospital admissions and re-admissions, which will also ensure that people who are fit to be discharged do not stay in hospital longer than needed, minimising risk of further deterioration. This supports the identification of stress and distress, Adults with Incapacity and future care planning to move upstream.
Local and national action is required to assess the effectiveness of current spend on dementia across the whole system, identifying options for redirecting investment to support delivery of this strategy’s vision and priorities.
Contact
Email: dementiapolicy@gov.scot
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