What if the biggest mistake we make about dementia is thinking it belongs in a medical file?
Dementia changes the way a person experiences the world, but it also changes families, workplaces, neighbourhoods, healthcare systems and entire communities. And yet, much of our response remains focused on the individual diagnosis rather than the environment surrounding them.
As leaders in aged care, there are three issues we need to confront.
We’re still designing communities for people who have perfect cognition.
Consider the person with dementia who walks into a supermarket and becomes overwhelmed by noise, lighting, signage and crowds. The problem may not be their dementia – the environment may simply be poorly designed for them.
Dementia-friendly communities aren’t about making everything “senior friendly”. They’re about designing environments that allow people with cognitive impairment to remain independent for longer.
For senior living executives, this should be a design and operational issue, not simply a clinical one.
We need to challenge the idea that dementia means someone stops contributing.
A diagnosis can quickly become an identity. Once labelled as “a dementia resident”, people can unintentionally become defined by what they’ve lost, rather than what they can still do.
Someone may no longer remember your name but they may still be an extraordinary gardener, cook, storyteller, parent or friend. And our care models need to preserve those roles.
The controversial question is: are we sometimes providing care that is safe for the organisation, rather than meaningful for the person?
Families don’t just need information. They need partnership.
Families are often expected to become experts overnight. One day they’re someone’s son, daughter or spouse, and the next they’re navigating diagnosis, medications, behaviour changes, finances, driving, legal decisions and care placement.
And they are doing it while grieving the gradual changes in someone they love.
We need to stop treating families as visitors to the care system: they are part of the care system.
The challenge for leaders
Dementia is going to affect virtually every organisation involved in ageing. At present, there are around 446,500 Australians living with dementia, with that number set to rise to over 1 million by 2065. So with more and more people experiencing dementia, are our communities ready to handle it?
If we genuinely believe in person-centred care, then we need to redesign our environments, rethink our language and involve families as partners – not afterthoughts.
Dementia care is about managing more than cognitive decline – it’s about protecting identity, dignity, relationships and purpose for as long as possible. And that requires strong leadership. If you’re involved in senior living, aged care or clinical practice, do you know what a dementia-ready community actually looks like? If not, it might be time to find out.
