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Page 11
Volume 2
allied
academies
June 11-13, 2018 | London, UK
Neurology and Neuroscience
6
th
International Conference on
L
ondon, the UK capital is home to 58% of all those who
identified themselves as African-Caribbean in the UK 2011
National Census. It is demographically the oldest of the Black
populations in the Census categories and proportionally has
a higher rate of dementia than the White UK majority. With
research indicating that vascular dementia and early onset
dementia is a growing issue for Caribbean men under the age
of 65 strong cultural beliefs lead many of those most at risk to
dismissanymainstreameffortsatpreventativehealtheducation.
Denial of problems and refusal to seek help or diagnosis can
often lead to a major crisis before there is any engagement
with professional support services and frustrate efforts to
develop ongoing links with services. Culture Dementia UK a
voluntary organisation has been working on awareness raising
and providing support in the African-Caribbean community in
London. The presentation explores how the African-Caribbean
cultural narrative of independence and resilience mitigates
against help-seeking in dementia and some of the approaches
adopted by Culture Dementia UK to raise awareness and
encourage people to look for support.
Speaker Biography
David Truswell has worked in community based mental health services in the UK for
over thirty years developing services for people with complex care needs and enduring
mental health problems in a career spanning the voluntary sector, local authority
services, and the NHS. From 2009 - 2011 he was the Dementia Implementation Lead
for Commissioning Support for London, working with commissioners across London to
improve dementia services. He is the founder and Director of the Dementia Alliance for
Culture and Ethnicity
(www.demace.com)and an independent writer and researcher
on dementia support and services for Black and minority ethnic communities, working
with a number of projects and initiatives.
e:
admin@demace.comDavid Truswell
Dementia Alliance for Culture and Ethnicity, UK
Raising awareness about vascular dementia in the African-Caribbean community in
the London