Ipswich and East Suffolk and West Suffolk CCGs will be working with Suffolk County Council to commission a Suffolk-wide peri-diagnosis Dementia Service, to start in April 2017.

Commissioners want to develop a model that complements the Integrated Health and Social Care principles of delivering secondary and tertiary prevention, crisis delay/mitigation, self-empowerment, locality focused, improved and simplified accessible advice and information encouraging independent community based ‘living well’ and improved outcomes.

Working with key stakeholders, the following ambition has been agreed for Suffolk: People will feel equipped to lead a healthy lifestyle to minimise risk of developing dementia.

Following any diagnosis, people, family carers and members of their support network will be able to live actively within their supportive communities, will have the knowledge and ability to sustain independent living and when required, will be assisted to access locally available help through just one contact via a single point of access.

They will be advised on the support they need and helped to the right place, where there will be no organisational barriers and will receive a timely response.

The service will be for anyone with diagnosed or suspected dementia or who care for them, both professionally or personally.

The service will have a complete understanding of the Suffolk system wide offer of services and systems of support.

High quality advice and consistent advice and information will be offered to anyone accessing the service appropriate to their needs at the time of contact.

The service will help individuals’ understanding of the needs of the person with dementia and develop their own resilience and help them stay connected with their local community and networks.

This will be a developmental model, with the future provider working with commissioners over the lifetime of the contract to review and improve the service offered and move towards a more flexible outcome based contracting model.

If you are interested in finding out more and meeting local commissioners to share your experience of delivering similar services elsewhere please register for the stakeholder engagement event on Wednesday 8 June, 9:30am – 12:30pm.

If you would like to register for this event or to find out any additional information please email hannah.neumann-may@westsuffolkccg.nhs.uk for further Information.