HAVE you ever thought “I wish I could make a difference in my community?” Well, you can.

As the number of people with dementia in the United Kingdom and around the world is steadily increasing, we are at a critical point in the need to transform how we care for people with dementia and support their carers.

There are 700,000 people in the UK with dementia. Dementia costs the UK economy £17 billion a year and, in the next 30 years, the number of people with dementia in the UK will double to 1.4 million, with the costs trebling to more than £50 billion a year. Our fragile health and social care service is facing its greatest ever challenges.

We at South Lakeland Carers see daily the deep-rooted failings of a divided health and social care system, that has left hundreds of thousands of unpaid carers bearing the brunt of the lack of funding provided for much-needed services that would ease their burden.

Carers tell us that suitable day care and regular respite breaks would make a huge difference to their lives but at the moment the provision for these services is sadly lacking.

Acknowledging people with dementia and their carers’ needs by providing a good-quality appropriate day care service for people living with dementia should be a priority for Cumbria County Council’s future plans.

Many of the challenges we face every day can only be changed and improved by recognition and financial intervention by those in power. Tomorrow, we will know who that power is, and hopefully they will recognise the impact dementia has in their health and social care policies.

Whether those policies take shape, we can all still ‘make a difference’ to the lives of people with dementia and their carers. Just by having more awareness about dementia and how it affects the person diagnosed and those around them will a make a huge difference in itself.

We need to be aware that the person’s abilities have changed and try to actively encourage them to carry on doing what they used to do by involving them in conversation and activities.

They may need a little more time to answer and engage in conversation, they may repeat themselves or not recognise you without a prompt, but the main thing you can offer is understanding.

We must be aware that our lack of confidence to engage with a person diagnosed with dementia affects the lives of carers (wife, husband, partner, mum, dad) - they, too, then become isolated and excluded from everyday life.

Most of all we ask you to be considerate and compassionate to people with a dementia diagnosis and their carers; by doing this you can really ‘make a difference’ to people’s lives.

To be able to provide services and support that really help carers of people living with dementia we really need to know if things that are already provided are working for you.

Kendal is a dementia friendly town supported by Kendal Dementia Action Alliance. We have Dementia Friends training from the Alzheimer’s Society and the soon to be launched South Lakes Dementia Hub, which all have the needs of people with dementia and their carers at the heart of their strategies. But is this enough?

Next week is Carers Week, and to carry on providing our services to support carers we need to recruit more volunteers. You can ‘make a difference’ by volunteering as little as three hours a month to one of our services, or becoming one of our respected and valued trustees.