Dementia is a topic that is in the news a great deal these days and awareness and understanding of its impacts and how it affects people has been growing. So I thought that it might be helpful for anyone reading this physiotherapy blog to look briefly at what dementia is and how physiotherapy can help patients with dementia.

Dementia is best thought of as a broad term or syndrome rather than a specific disease. It covers symptoms such as memory loss, drops in cognitive function, understanding and general thinking skills. Alzheimer’s Disease is by far the most common cause of dementia but there are many other causes such as vascular dementia. I guess one question that may strike anyone reading this blog is: “what does physiotherapy have to do with dementia?”. Well as physiotherapists who visit patients at home and in care homes we see many elderly patients who have some element of dementia. This may simply be a difficulty with memory but in other cases we see patients with severe dementia and help to manage their physical symptoms. As such as physiotherapists we need to be aware of how dementia presents and how as physiotherapists we can work around the difficulties that it presents and best help our patients with dementia.

A brief look at some statistics around dementia might illuminate the scale of the issue: over 750,000 people are living in the UK with dementia and given that dementia mostly affects the elderly and we have an aging population this is only likely to grow in number. Up to 1 in 4 people in a hospital bed in the UK has dementia and by 2039 it is estimated that dementia will cost the UK £50bn per year!!

Patients with dementia have varied symptoms and how their dementia presents is often specific to their situation but often they have problems with memory, understanding, following instructions, communication and sometimes visual disturbances. When working with patients with dementia, as physiotherapists, we have to be aware of these challenges and try to work around them. For example we will generally make sure that all of our exercise programmes are written down and have pictures if appropriate and that these are given to carers or care staff (if in a care home) so that the carers can help the patient with their exercises. We also try to be patient and explain carefully to patients with dementia what the exercises are and why it is important to do them, taking time with patients with dementia and not rushing is vital to getting the best results in our experience.

One of the major reasons that we see patients with dementia is that they often have reduced mobility and need someone to come out and help them with this. The reasons that their mobility has become impaired are varied but often they have lost confidence, their balance has declined and they have begun to spend a large part of the day sitting or in bed.

Okay, I hope that you have enjoyed reading this blog. If anyone you know is suffering with dementia and their mobility is reducing then please get in touch. We offer a home visit physiotherapy service in Lichfield, Tamworth, Sutton Coldfield, Cannock, Walsall & Rugeley.