Most people with dementia live, and many die, at home. The person who knows them best in those final months is often not a clinician but a home care worker coming through the door several times a day, doing some of the hardest work in the dementia pathway with little training and almost no research behind them. This episode asks what good home care actually looks like, why it is so hard to deliver, and what one study is doing about it.

Host Dr Alice Carstairs is joined by the PALLDEM Homecare team from the Cicely Saunders Institute at King's College London: Dr Lesley Williamson, who co-leads the study; research assistant Annika Dhawan, who runs the engagement work; and Dr Clare Ellis-Smith, who developed the IPOS Dem outcome measure. They are joined by lived experience expert Alan Richardson, who cared for his mother for 15 years, and Tony O'Flaherty, director at Home Instead Wandsworth, Lambeth and Dulwich.

Together they cover what IPOS Dem is, why home care gets so little attention, what it really takes to get a tool used on the ground, and why recognition for this workforce is overdue.

Essential Links:

• Famileo - https://bit.ly/FamileoDR26
• PALLDEM-Homecare - https://bit.ly/4e6bdvd
• IPOS-Dem - https://bit.ly/4vJgkaA

Key topics:

• Role of home care workers in dementia support
• Implementation of iPOSDEM in home care settings
• Challenges and solutions in home care for dementia
• Research and innovation in community dementia care

This episode is sponsored by Famileo. Helping families living with dementia stay close with a personalised printed magazine, delivered monthly. Over a quarter of a million families already use Famileo to stay connected. First month free with code DR26. https://bit.ly/FamileoDR26

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This podcast is sponsored by Famileo. The sponsor had no involvement in the planning, production, editorial decisions, or content of this episode.