Living with Dementia

Chris Ruane Excerpts

Tuesday 25th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I congratulate my hon. Friends the Members for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) and for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) on securing this important debate. I support their vision to make this Parliament the first dementia-friendly Parliament in the world. My staff and I have undertaken dementia-friendly training in my constituency office. It is important for us all to try to promote a more dementia-friendly society, sector by sector, institution by institution and, as mentioned previously, shop by shop.

It is great that so many Members want to participate in the debate—it shows how active this is in our personal lives and our communities. A wide range of issues has been covered so far. We have looked at the impact on loved ones who are living with dementia and their carers, financial assistance and protection for people living with dementia, research, social care costs, dementia-friendly shops and institutions, and therapies that can help people who are living with dementia, such as music therapy. I want to touch on the role that I think mindfulness can play in helping people who are living with dementia and their carers.

I co-chair the all-party parliamentary group on mindfulness with the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton). On Tuesday 14 May, we held a conference in the Macmillan room on mindfulness in an ageing world, including those living with Alzheimer’s. We had 150 people attending, including 15 of the charities representing elderly people, including the Alzheimer’s Society.

We heard from experts from around the world and the UK who have been doing research on mindfulness, ageing and Alzheimer’s. Dr Antoine Lutz of the centre for medical research at the University of Lyon has won a €7 million grant for research into ageing well and Alzheimer’s. We also heard from Dr Lone Fjorback from Aarhus University in Denmark, where they have a week-long festival for mental health to look at the issues in a positive light. From the UK, we heard from Dr Trudi Eddington, who is a British research scientist at City University researching those currently suffering with dementia. We also heard from Dr Eric Loucks, the associate professor of epidemiology, and behaviour and social sciences at Brown University.

There is promising early research out there. We used to think of the brain as set at the age of 25 and declining after that age. Now they have discovered neuroplasticity: how our brain changes size, function and shape over the course of our lives. Actions we take can encourage and discourage that. I ask the Minister and her advisers to assess that research, and particularly the research from the University of Lyon, which will be published later in the summer, and to meet officers of our all-party parliamentary group on mindfulness. I also ask the all-party parliamentary group on dementia and the Alzheimer’s Society to do the same. I pay tribute to that APPG and the Alzheimer’s Society, and all of those who work to lessen the suffering of those living with dementia and their carers.