Upcoming webinar

January 2024 – Music interventions in dementia

Join us on the 31st of January from 11 am – 12 pm to talk about music interventions in dementia. At the Webinar, Kym Ward from The Brain Charity and Dr Megan Polden from the NIHR ARC NWC and University of Liverpool will share their experiences of running a music intervention for dementia in the Liverpool region, and evaluating this. The presenters will start by providing a wider background on the potential impacts of music on people with dementia as a psychosocial intervention, and then share their experiences.

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November 2023: Prof Ann-Marie Towers (Kent) shared her research on measuring and improving quality of life for older adults using social care. You can view her talk here on our youtube channel.

September 2023: Dr Anna Volkmer (UCL) shared her research and clinical work on primary progressive aphasia and rare dementias. You can view her talk here on our youtube channel.

July 2023: Prof Bianca Brijnath (NARI, Australia) discussed her work on cultural diversity in dementia.

May 2023: Wendy Weidner from Alzheimer’s Disease International shared ADI’s global work on improving dementia diagnosis and care and raising awareness.

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22nd March 1-2 pm

“How can we improve wellbeing and quality of life for people with dementia and their carers: Insights from a process evaluation“

Danielle Wyman, a final year PhD student at Anglia Ruskin University, is running a process evaluation on the New Interventions for independence in Dementia Study (NIDUS) Family stream randomised controlled trial.

The NIDUS Trial is an Alzheimer’s Society funded psychosocial intervention, led by Prof Claudia Cooper, to support people living with dementia to achieve goals that they and their family carers set, towards living as independently and as well as possible at home for longer.

The process evaluation looks at how the intervention influences change over the 12-month trial period through analysing various data including qualitative interviews with participants and facilitators, and descriptive quantitative trial outcome data.

As always, there will be plenty of time for questions after the talk, and everyone is welcome!

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25th January 1-2 pm

“The link between hearing loss and dementia: who is listening?“

In our January webinar Forum, we will be hearing from two dementia researchers and one carer about their research into and experiences of dementia and hearing loss.

Hearing loss is a major public health concern, and the negative impact of hearing loss does not end with a person’s ability to hear as commonly believed. Losing the ability to hear can dramatically impact how one interacts with others and experiences life; hearing loss affects communication, educational opportunities, work participation and employability, family life, and social life. In addition, hearing loss was recently identified as the most prominent risk factor for dementia. However, the mechanisms underlying the link between hearing loss and dementia are still unclear. We also have limited understanding of the experiences and needs of people living with both hearing loss and dementia.

In the first part of the webinar, Dr Dalia Tsimpida will present a brief overview of the current understanding of the link between hearing loss and dementia. In the second part of the webinar, Dr Eithne Heffernan will present the findings of her research about the experiences and priorities of people living with dementia and/or hearing conditions and their families, as well as clinicians and researchers working in this field. Eithne will also highlight the importance of ensuring underserved groups are represented in dementia and hearing research studies.

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30th November 1-2 pm

“Social and spatial inequalities in healthcare use for people living with dementia”

In our November Forum webinar, final year PhD student James Watson (University of Liverpool) will be discussing his published research into inequalities in healthcare usage for people living with dementia.

In his talk, he will be looking at how different demographic, geographic and socio-economic groups use various types of primary (GP observations, dementia and non-dementia medications) and secondary healthcare (A&E attendances, emergency and elective hospital admissions). His research highlights how several groups of people with dementia with healthcare use have more negative health outcomes. To reduce inequalities in healthcare use and subsequent health outcomes, people living with dementia need greater continuity of healthcare, health checks and medicines reviews, as well as more culturally appropriate services and better infrastructure, allowing for more equitable service access.

As always, the Forum is open to anyone with an interest in dementia and ageing. After James talk, there will be opportunity to ask questions.

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7th September 1-2 pm

“Innovative dementia care environments as alternatives for traditional nursing homes: evidence and experiences from the Netherlands“

In September’s Forum event, we have a special international guest from the Netherlands: Prof Hilde Verbeek!

Hilde is Professor in Long-Term Care at Maastricht University and works with the Living Lab – a network of care homes and academic institutions to embed care home needs in research. In her talk, Hilde will talk about innovative care environments as alternatives for traditional nursing homes.

Key goals of the dementia care environment focus on increasing autonomy, supporting independence and trying to enable the own lifestyle for as long as possible. To meet these goals, innovative, small-scale and homelike care environments have been developed that have radically changed of the physical, social and organizational aspects in the Netherlands. This presentation discusses various Dutch models that have implemented small-scale and homelike care environments, including green care farms, dementia village and citizen initiatives. The models reflect a common care concept, focusing on residents’ remaining strengths, providing opportunity for choice and aiming to sustain a sense of self and control. A small number of residents (usually 6 to 8) live together in a homelike environment and nursing staff is part of the household. Residents are encouraged to participate in daily household activities, emphasizing normalization of daily life with person-centred care. The physical environment resembles an archetypal home. This talk presents the scientific evidence on the impact and effects of these small-scale, homelike models on residents, their family caregivers and staff. Furthermore, the presentation will highlight working mechanisms and how these initiatives have influenced regular care within the long-term care spectrum.

The Forum is open to anyone interested in dementia and ageing.

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20th July 1-2 pm

“Resilience in dementia carers: Pursuing a gold standard measure”

In July’s Liverpool Dementia and Ageing Research Forum webinar, Dr Warren Donnellan presents on a recent methodological review of resilience measurement scales that have been applied to informal carers of people living with dementia.

Dr Warren Donnellan is a Chartered Psychologist and Lecturer based in the Department of Psychology at the University of Liverpool. He is an internationally recognised expert on resilience and caregiving across the life course, with a particular focus on dementia care.

Caring for a loved one with dementia is uniquely stressful. In order to deliver personalised and timely support to carers, we need to better understand individual differences in response to caregiving stressors and identify the factors that protect carers rather than just the factors that hinder them. Resilience measurement may go some way towards achieving this. He argues that most resilience scales lack conceptual adequacy and there is currently no gold standard resilience measure for informal carers. On this basis, Warren presents the preliminary development and validation of the Ecological Resilience Scale and concludes with some critical reflections on conducting psychometric research.

The event is free and open to the public, and the talk will be in lay format. The event is for academics, health and social care providers, commissioners, charities, and people with personal experiences of dementia, everyone is welcome! As always, there will be plenty of time for questions.

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18th May 1-2 pm

“Sexuality and relationships in care homes – what are staff experiences and training needs?”

In this May webinar, taking place during #DementiaActionWeek, Fran Chaisty will discuss her research into sexuality and relationships in care homes.

Fran is a final year DClin Trainee at the University of Liverpool. The concept of sexuality in older age can be a difficult and often embarrassing topic for discussion, combined with the common myth of asexuality in old age alongside changes to functioning including, at times, dementia. Collectively this can mean that sexuality is a potentially challenging area for discussion and consideration for caring practices for those working in care homes. This research sought to explore care homes’ staff perspectives on the topic, through one-to-one semi-structured interviews, and the collation of this data into a model to build a better understanding of staff experiences. The aim is for these findings to inform future practices to best develop training and ensure support for staff when considering the needs of their resident’s in relation to sexuality.

As always, everyone is welcome at #LiverpoolDementia, and there will be plenty of opportunities to ask Fran questions after her talk and discuss the topic at large.

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March webinar 2022

“Dementia care after a diagnosis – How can Admiral Nurses and Dementia Care Navigators help?”

Join us for the next free public webinar in March, where we will hear from Lead Admiral Nurse Jeanette Hogg and Mersey Care Dementia Care Navigator manager Emma Stafford about the services they provide, and what type of care you can access if you live with or care for someone with dementia.