Western Alzheimer’s could be forced to ‘scale down’

Michael Commins

MARIAN House, the Western Alzheimer Foundation’s headquarters in Ballindine, may have to scale down services by March 2016, unless improvement works to the tune of around €500,000 are put in place to upgrade it to the HIQA standards.
Mayo Fine Gael TD Michelle Mulherin has asked for assistance for Western Alzheimers to upgrade their 12-bed respite care facility at Marian House to meet HIQA standards so that they will be able to continue to provide their service after March 2016.
Speaking in the Dail on Dementia Services, Deputy Mulherin said Western Alzheimers provides respite for 510 families in counties Mayo, Roscommon and Galway, but has been told by HIQA that it must carry out €500,000 improvement works to the premises, or it will have to scale down or possibly shut down in March 2016.
Addressing the Minister for Health, Deputy Mulherin said: “There is a waiting time at Marian House in Ballindine between eight to 12 weeks for families to get much needed respite. It is tailor-made care for people with Alzheimer’s. What assistance is available to such independent community respite care homes? They are providing a service not provided by the HSE and should be assisted.
“There are approximately 48,000 people with dementia and Alzheimer’s in this country. Some 63% of them are being cared for in the community, which in effect means in their own homes.
“Most of the €27.5 million pledged for the provision of integrated dementia services to be spent on community care services for people suffering with dementia is predominantly being spent in big centres of population. Only 500 families might benefit of the 30,000 people who are living with dementia at home and being supported by a community care policy.
“I understand that only 56 of those packages have been authorised, despite all that funding. I am concerned because in County Mayo, we have an estimated 1,835 people with dementia but I am not aware that any of this funding is going to the county. The county has an ageing population and a proportionately higher number of older people compared to other counties.
“Caring for the carers means that as well as having integrated care packages, we should also provide respite for carers.”