Memory Services National Accreditation Programme

Reduced subscription fee from Monday 22 February 2010!

Best estimates suggest that the number of UK residents with dementia stands at 700,000, with 570,000 of these living in England. Currently, the cost to the UK economy of caring for people with dementia is £17 billion a year. In the next 30 years, the number of people with dementia is expected to double, and the associated costs to treble to over £50 billion per year.

 

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE)/Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) guideline Dementia: supporting people with dementia and their carers in health and social care offers a clear summary of the immense amount that can be done to bring quality to the life of people with dementia at all stages of their illness.

 

The National Audit Office study: Improving Services and Support for People with Dementia revealed not only the shortcomings in our current systems, but also highlighted the likelihood that investing in improving the quality of services for people with dementia would lead not only to enhanced quality of life, but also to savings in terms of use of acute hospital services and admission to care homes.

 

The National Dementia Strategy, published in February 2009, will play a central role in ensuring that the needs of people with dementia become and remain a priority. The Strategy outlines 17 key objectives which, when implemented, should result in significant improvements to the services received by people with dementia.  

 

Memory Services offer timely assessment, diagnostic, therapeutic, rehabilitation and support services for people with memory problems/dementia and their carers within a multidisciplinary setting. They provide a cost-effective way of increasing the number of people seen for early diagnosis and intervention and help to reduce the stigma associated with dementia and its consequences.

 

The Royal College of Psychiatrists Centre for Quality Improvement (CCQI) has developed a quality improvement accreditation programme for memory services.  The programme will:

 

  • apply clinical and organisational standards for the assessment and diagnosis of dementia in a system of self- and external peer-review;
  • support local clinical and service improvement in line with the network standards;
  • produce reports for each service, highlighting areas of achievement and areas for improvement;
  • produce a national report which will allow services to compare their activity and indicators of quality with all other services;
  • award an accreditation status.

 

The work is underpinned by a set of quality standards drawn from relevant policies and guidelines and advice from partner organisations. The standards have been revised in line with feedback from the pilot phase of this programme and the first edition was published in June 2009.

 

Memory services across the North-West of England participated in the Care Services Improvement Partnership (CSIP NW) funded pilot and have undergone the processes of self and peer review. The attendees at the MSNAP feedback event in April 2009 provided input, comments and suggestions on the standards and all aspects of the review process, which have been invaluable when revising the standards and refining the methods employed.

 

The programme commenced nationwide from June 2009 and we are excited to begin the accreditation process with our new members.

 

 

Call for participants

 

The programme runs entirely on subscription fees from our members. The annual fee for this programme has been reduced and is now £2400 plus VAT. If your service is interested in joining MSNAP, please complete the registration form and return to the MSNAP Project Team.

 

 

Useful documents

 

 

 

Contact details

 

We are always pleased to hear from people who are interested in joining the programme or who would like to find out a bit more about our work. Feel free to contact us on the details below.

 

Emily Doncaster

Deputy Programme Manager

020 7977 6644

edoncaster@cru.rcpsych.ac.uk

 

Sophie Hodge

Project Worker

020 7977 4971

shodge@cru.rcpsych.ac.uk

 

 

© 2010 Royal College of Psychiatrists