Cruse Bereavement Care Cymru and Alzheimer’s Society in Wales working together

Funded by the Welsh Government Sustainable Social Services Third Sector Grant 2016-2019, Cruse Cymru and the Alzheimer’s Society in Wales are joining in a new partnership to address the bereavement needs of:

• – People with dementia who have lost a loved one/carer
• – People bereaved by someone with dementia.

The project has a special focus on older bereaved people with dementia and ways of working with this especially vulnerable client group.

The aim is to deliver a successfully tested model of working which incorporates raising awareness of how bereavement affects older people’s mental and physical health, improving access to support for bereaved older people, encouraging self-help and peer support in order to reduce loneliness and social isolation and help safeguard and promote long term mental and physical health.

The focus will be on increasing and improving access to Cruse bereavement support; jointly raising awareness of bereavement when the person had dementia and the impact of this kind of grief; and on developing awareness raising training sessions and information specifically for a person bereaved by a loved one with dementia and those with dementia being bereaved.

The project will jointly design, develop and deliver a Bereavement Support & Dementia Awareness training module to be delivered in cross sector settings such as Care Homes (one third of people living with dementia live in a care home), Hospices, Hospitals and all other Health & Social Care settings and throughout the voluntary sector. In addition to the training module, a jointly branded resource pack of leaflets/factsheets will be developed which can be uploaded to both websites and in time will be shared across the wider public health and mental health networks.

The ‘Bereaved by Dementia’ project over the next three years will deliver:

– A volunteer Recruitment Campaign – 120 new trained volunteers over 3 years (40 per year)
– Design, develop and jointly deliver a Bereavement Support & Dementia Awareness training module
– Develop jointly branded awareness raising/ information resource packs
– Deliver four information sessions per annum to statutory and third sector organisations, utilising the networks and relationships of both organisations sites/settings i.e. through Dementia Cafés.
– Raise awareness of Cruse services in the dementia community.

Janette Bourne, Director of Cruse Bereavement Care said; “This partnership is an exciting opportunity to develop the work of both organisations in order to address the bereavement needs of this particularly vulnerable group of people and raise awareness of how to access the support Cruse Bereavement Care Cymru provide.”

Sue Phelps, Director of Alzheimer’s Society in Wales said; “People living with dementia may experience a range of emotions when bereaved and for people affected by dementia, they may be coping with some added and unique challenges as a consequence of the condition.  By working with Cruse Bereavement Care Cymru, we will meet the complex needs of people with dementia, their carers and families who are faced with a bereavement.”