Dementia impacts upon people and families in a number of ways, the most obvious impacts relate to an individual’s ability to function in relation to key tasks, something which deteriorates over time although initially may not prevent an individual functioning well.

There are significant impacts upon partners, families and loved ones, especially those with carer responsibilities, again these impacts escalate over time although some aspects of behaviour may be significant at earlier stages of disease progression.

Local prevalence for Knowsley was reported to be 69.3% of those expected to have a diagnosis with a formal diagnosis (September 2015). Prevalence of dementia as reported via the Quality Outcomes Framework for 2014/15 tells us that nationally circa 0.75% of the population has dementia, in Knowsley the prevalence is 0.70% of the population which places the CCG in the third quartile ranking it 137 out of 209 CCG’s.

the rate of diagnosis for Knowsley which has risen steadily in recent years. Whilst the CCG has increased dementia diagnosis rates over the last few years to place it in the upper part of the third quartile of those patients diagnosed with dementia nationally, there is still a gap (March 2015) between the expected number of those diagnosed and the actual numbers diagnosed.

The biggest risk factor for dementia is age, the older people are the more likely they are to develop the condition, but it is not an inevitable part of ageing. About two in 100 people aged 65 to 69 years have dementia, and this figure rises to one in five for those aged 85 to 89. Evidence suggests this appears to be true for Dementia With Lewy Bodies (DLB) also, however, there is very little evidence about the risk factors for this disease.

The full JSNA report can be read here: Dementia JSNA