§ Mr. Barry JonesTo ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) if he will make a statement on the basic training nurses receive in respect of Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia; [3272]
(2) what steps he has taken to improve the training of health and social care professionals in respect of people with Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia. [3271]
§ Mr. BurnsSuch training is primarily the responsibility of the relevant professional bodies and of the organisations which employ health and social care professionals.
Students who undertake pre-registration nursing programmes in adult or mental health nursing gain an understanding of the various forms of dementia arid the care and treatment of people with dementia, including Alzheimer's disease.
The Department has contributed funding towards the provision of training material on dementia for mental health professionals. We commissioned Manchester university to produce training literature in mental health, including specific guidance on older people with mental health problems. We helped the Alzheimer's Disease Society with the production costs of its recent training pack for general practitioner trainers, "Dementia in the Community: management strategies for general practice". 154W The Department also contributed funding to a recent feasibility study led by the British Medical Association into an educational video for GPs on dementia.
§ Mr. JonesTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what estimate he has made of the number of people suffering from Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia(a) at present and (b) for the year 2006. [3274]
§ Mr. BurnsWe estimate that there were around 600,000 people with a diagnosis of dementia, including Alzheimer's disease, in 1994, which will rise to 652,000 in 2006.
§ Mr. JonesTo ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make a statement on the current state of research(a) funded and (b) evaluated by his Department into Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia. [3275]
§ Mr. BurnsThe Department runs two separate research programmes: the policy research programme and the national health service research and development programme. The latest available information on research being carried out under the policy research programme is contained in "The Centrally Commissioned Research Programme: Commissions in 1994–95", copies of which are in the Library.
The NHS research and development programme consists of a number of national programmes and regional research activity. The mental health programme includes a project examining the development of screening tests for dementia and depression in ethnic elders; it also includes a project which is examining dementia information in order to develop a model to establish the number of people in a given population needing specific dementia services. Information is not available centrally on all the regional research projects being undertaken. The projects on which information is available centrally include a study of the patterns and consequences of semantic memory impairment in Alzheimer's disease; a community-based control study of dementias; a study of neuronal structure in aging and Alzheimer's based dementia; and cognitive decline, dementia and aging in people with Down's syndrome: a study of the risk factors and care needs.