National dementia expert joins Care UK

Company news

Nov 28, 2013

Dr Nori Graham, Vice President and former Chairman of the national Alzheimer's Society of England and Alzheimer's Disease International, has become a non-executive director with independent health and social care provider Care UK.

Dr Graham will support Care UK with its dementia strategy, which is being developed to ensure excellent specialist care in its 112 homes across the country. Dr Graham, whose career in old age psychiatry in the NHS took her into many care homes, believes that the hallmark of great care is knowledge of each individual in a home.

She said: “It is crucial that people who are being cared for are treated as individuals who have past histories and their own likes and dislikes. Good care involves treating every person as a unique individual and taking and maintaining the effort to be really well informed about each and every resident. Only when you truly understand a person can you adapt your way of caring and, by doing that, carers come to treat the person as a loved individual.”

Dr Graham is keen to help Care UK progress its dementia strategy to ensure consistency of care as it develops more specialist dementia homes nationwide. She said: “I believe care providers have a duty to offer high quality dementia care and my aim is to ensure that every Care UK home has a detailed understanding about the condition and its effects. Residents deserve to be supported by compassionate teams delivering personalised care and relatives should be treated as an equal and valued part of that team.

“Care UK has invested significantly in dementia training and I am committed to helping the organisation to continue to innovate in this area. Colleagues need to feel happy and confident in the skills they develop to genuinely understand each resident and we must be dedicated to providing sector-leading dementia care.”

Mike Parish, chief executive at Care UK, added: “I am delighted that Dr Graham has decided to join us. Her expertise will help us to continue to develop outstanding dementia care for residents, support for relatives and training for our teams.”