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Four Rivers Dementia Alliance

The 4RDA Blog

September - More Tasks In Hand And Spreading The Word

30/9/2025

September has been a bit quieter in terms of meetings but still lots of things being worked on!

• I submitted an article about the work of Four Rivers and Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm to Bigbury and Ringmore News which was for their October/November edition. However, the editor advised that due to a huge amount of local events for that issue, they were unable to include the article but would put it in the next one (December/January).

• The same article was submitted to the Diptford and North Huish Parish News and has been printed in their September issue.

• I attended a Four Rivers meeting (Which was rescheduled from 03/09/25 to 15/09/25) to update on the work of both Four Rivers and Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm. Resulting from that, a care home provider manager asked for some information/support re: improving their dementia services. I am currently waiting to hear back re: a suitable meeting date for this.

• I attended an Erme and Yealm Caring Alliance meeting (17/09/25) to update on the work of both the Four Rivers and Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm.

• I met with Liz Hitchins, Four Rivers Chair and Ian Sherriff BEM, Academic Partnership Lead for Dementia, University of Plymouth (10/09/25) to plan the content of the workshop on dementia friendly communities that we will be delivering at the Devon Association of Local Councils (DALC) AGM (01/10/25). I also created slides for my part of the presentation.


• After attending the Alzheimer’s Society essential content Dementia Friends update session back in August, I also discovered that there had been updates to the resources to be used with children and young people. To reflect these changes, I had to make a few amendments to the final edit of the “working towards becoming dementia friendly” information pack I drafted for schools. It is now ready to go to print.

• I continued mapping community resources and attractions that could be approached re: becoming dementia friendly across the Four Rivers catchment area. As the area is a large one, this will be an ongoing piece of research for a while.

A few other things in the pipeline are:

• I will be meeting with Liz Hitchins and Katie Chaplin, Teignbridge CVS (06/10/25) to discuss dementia being a focus of the next South Hams District Caring Alliance meeting (28/10/25).

• I will be meeting with Melanie Ford, Older Person’s Community Builder, (06/10/25) to discuss how to make spaces and groups dementia friendly.

• I am booked to attend a parish council meeting in Modbury (07/10/25) to talk about the work of the Four Rivers Dementia Alliance and the support available to become a dementia friendly parish council and village.

• I will be attending the next South Hams Dementia Forum meeting (15/10/25) where I will be speaking about my role within Four Rivers Dementia Alliance and how the parishes are starting to work on becoming dementia friendly, with support.

• I am booked to attend a parish meeting in Harford (05/10/25) to talk about the work of 4RDA and the support available to become dementia friendly.

• I will complete the draft of the dementia friendly guide for GP practices. After that, I will begin working on one for the care sector.

August - A Variety Of Tasks In Hand And Still Ongoing

1/9/2025

I have undertaken a variety of tasks were various things have been happening during August:

• I met with the councillor who is the designated lead for dementia friendly work at Shaugh Prior parish council (04/08/25) to discuss how they would like to make a start on working towards becoming dementia friendly. I am currently awaiting an update on this.

• I returned to South Brent District & Caring to deliver another awareness session to more of their volunteer team, some volunteers from another local charity and the public (04/08/25). This was once again, well attended and well received. I followed this up with one attendee by sending them some information they requested about dementia friendly signage guidance.

• I attended an essential content Dementia Friends update session (19/08/25). Dementia Friends is an initiative by the Alzheimer’s Society and the awareness sessions I deliver in the community are part of this so this was a necessary and very useful session.

• I continued to contact a variety of parish/village magazines and newsletters across the 4RDA area to request writing an article about the work of 4RDA and Dementia Friendly Parishes, to raise awareness and hopefully encourage some more people to get involved in 4RDA. I submitted an article to the Modbury Messenger (Due to be published in the September edition).

• The “working towards becoming dementia friendly” information pack I drafted for schools has now been edited and is ready to go to print. The retailer’s guide will be edited next. I have also continued to work on the draft guide for GP practices.

• I started mapping community resources and attractions that could be approached re: becoming dementia friendly (An action agreed at a previous 4RDA meeting). This will continue until all parishes have been researched.

A few other things in the pipeline going into September and beyond:

• When I have completed drafting the dementia friendly guide for GP practices, I will start working on one for care homes.

• I will be submitting an article about the work of Four Rivers and Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm to Bigbury & Ringmore News for their October/November edition.

• I will be attending a Four Rivers meeting (03/09/25) and an Erme & Yealm Caring Alliance meeting (17/09/25) to update on the work of both the Four Rivers Dementia Alliance and Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm.

• I will be meeting with Liz Hitchins, Four Rivers Chair and Ian Sherriff BEM, Academic Partnership Lead for Dementia, University of Plymouth (10/09/25) to plan the content of the workshop on dementia friendly communities that we will be delivering at the Devon Association of Local Councils AGM (01/10/25).

• I am booked to attend a Modbury parish council meeting (07/10/25) to talk about the work of 4RDA and the support available to become a dementia friendly parish council and village.

July - A Multitude Of Tasks In Hand And Ongoing

31/7/2025

During July, I have been working on a few different things:

• Following on from attending Kingston’s parish council meeting in June, I returned to the village to carry out a dementia friendly building assessment of the reading room, with one of the committee members (21/07/25). My written report has been discussed with the other committee members and they plan to implement as much as is practicable.

• I attended the Global Plymouth Launch Event for Phase 2 at the University of Plymouth (16.07.25) with my information stand. The event was about bringing together the commercial and third sector. I did not get the opportunity to speak as planned but nonetheless, the event was a great opportunity to network with other organisations present and let them know about the work of both 4RDA and Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm.

• I attended the South Hams District Caring Alliance meeting at Follaton House, Totnes (23/07/25) and gave an update about the work of 4RDA and Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm. Again, it presented the chance to start forming connections with a few of the great variety of organisations that were present.

• I attended the Yealmpton Show (30.07.25) with my Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm colleagues. Our information stand also included 4RDA information as the show always attracts a lot of footfall so is a terrific opportunity to promote the dementia friendly approach.

• I contacted a variety of parish/village magazines and newsletters across the 4RDA area to request writing an article about the work of 4RDA and a Dementia Friendly Parishes, to raise awareness and hopefully encourage some more people to get involved in 4RDA. I submitted an article to Kingston Parish Newsletter (Due to be published in the August edition) and one to Ugborough Parish News (Due to be published in the September edition).

• The “working towards becoming dementia friendly” information packs I drafted for schools and for retailers are currently both being edited and they will then go to print in early August.

Other things in the pipeline are:

• My work on writing an information pack for GP practices has started and will continue throughout next month.

• I will be meeting with the councillor who has recently become the designated lead for dementia friendly work at Shaugh Prior parish council (04/08/25) to discuss how they would like to make a start on working towards becoming dementia friendly.

• I will be returning to South Brent District & Caring to deliver another awareness session to more of their volunteer team (04/08/25). This session will also be open to the public.

• I will be submitting articles about the work of 4RDA and Dementia Friendly Parishes Around the Yealm to Ugborough Parish News and Modbury Messenger for their September editions and Bigbury & Ringmore News for their October/November edition.