STAFF at our Darlington care home have been learning more about dementia through a series of Dementia Friends Information sessions.  This is one part of our wider project, striving to make the home a leader in being 100% dementia friendly with which we are working hard with a dementia specialist to achieve.  

The sessions which have been held at The Gardens Care Home are delivered for everyone, aiming to help staff understand more about dementia and around 20 people have become dementia friends through this initiative.  Our wider project is to provide a varied range of dementia training and tools for support and the first stage of this is our commitment to getting every single staff member acess to being a 'Dementia Friend'.

Director of Ascot Care, Gareth Nesbit, said ‘There are 850,000 people with dementia in the UK and numbers are set to rise to over 1 million by 2025.

We’ve had five sessions so far and these are vital to ensure we are supporting people living with dementia in every way possible. It’s about learning more regarding dementia and the small ways you can help. From telling friends about Dementia Friends to visiting someone you know living with dementia, every action counts.’

Stephen Briscoe who runs the sessions said, ‘The feedback from the attendees including ascot care staff was really positive and demonstrated the impact the sessions has had on participants thinking about their dementia understandingg opene. The groups have been so helpful and supportive of each other, I think the way ascot care are going about this and the effort they are putting into providing additional awareness and training to as many people as possible is fantastic.”

Ascot Care is a family run business and has six care homes across the North East. The sessions are being delivered every month to all staff in The Gardens plus the Ascot Care Agency home care staff.

The sessions are also now open to family, friends and members of the public across the local community in the coming months which will ensure Ascot Care will be at the forefront of delivering personalised care to people living with dementia across their whole community.

To find out when our next session is and to book contact ascot care on kimbourne@ascotcare.co.uk To learn more about becoming a Dementia Friend, please visit