Sensory impairment leads to wider social implications
People living with dementia in Scotland face poor care and social isolation, or at worst falling through the cracks of care, new research published today suggests.
Hearing and sight assessments are not routinely being carried out as part of dementia assessments, according to the new data published by the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland.
Today the Alliance is calling for sensory assessments to be a mandatory part of dementia assessments, especially with dementia cases set to rise by 50% in the next 20 years.
A lack of proper sight or hearing assessment, or clear guidelines on who is responsible for assessments, can lead to poor and inadequate care, or, at worst, peoples' sensory impairments being continually missed.
This can mean plans being drawn up for their care that don’t meet their needs, and on a personal level, lead to further isolation and loss of connection.
According to the research, over two thirds of GPs (76%) surveyed were not checking hearing and sight as part of a memory/dementia assessment, or only did so if Deafness, Deafblindness or Visual Impairment was suspected.
In addition, many were not aware of existing dementia assessment tools that exist to support people with sensory impairments.
Similar results were found among other healthcare professionals.
Dr Hannah Tweed, from the Alliance, the third sector membership organisation representing the health and social care sector, said:
“Most dementia assessments rely on people being able to see or hear the questions. Yet, research from the Alliance shows people are typically being diagnosed as having dementia, without consideration of whether they have a sensory impairment.
“Brain changes caused by dementia can have similar symptoms to Deafness, Deafblindness or Visual Impairment – and many people experience both dementia and sensory impairment. But even when standard dementia assessments are done, the results aren't able to separate dementia brain changes from sensory impairments which commonly overlap.
“Confusing dementia symptoms with sensory impairments can lead to health and social care plans that don’t meet people’s needs. In addition, people with dementia can already feel disconnected from those around them, and undiagnosed Deafness or Visual Impairment means they may lose close connections and independence.
“People can be supported with accessible communication and assistive technology to remain independent for as long as possible, if their communication needs are correctly identified. This includes consideration of Deaf BSL users. Without that support, they are likely to fall through cracks in the system.”
Isabella Goldie, Chief Executive of Deafblind Scotland, said: “We have long understood that without specialist approaches to dementia assessment we are simply underdiagnosing and losing valuable opportunities to act early. This is especially true for Deafblind people, who already face challenging lives including many barriers to good quality health care. Deafblindness has become recognised as a distinct disability in Scotland and is more common in older people, affecting around 30,000 people.
“As we age it is unlikely many of us will escape one or more sensory losses and if we are to reach everyone that would benefit from early dementia support we need to begin to accept that sensory loss is common and impacts on our ability to process information and communicate effectively.”
She added: “We hope this report will shed light on these gaps and lead to the creation of different ways of assessing memory changes that are not completely reliant on hearing and sight.”
