Video features dementia-friendly churches

A collaboration between Staffordshire University and Anna Chaplaincy in Rochester Diocese, in Cumbria and elsewhere, has resulted in a 16-minute film on dementia and churches.

We see how churches are reaching out to people living with dementia through worship, memory cafes and informal networks supporting carers.

Our own Julia Burton-Jones from the Anna Chaplaincy team is interviewed, and we hear from the Church of England's lead spokesman on health and social care, the Right Revd James Newcome, as well.

He says, 'The church has a direct responsibility for making people with dementia feel welcome and to care for them, and I think this initiative and the tool kit we are providing is going to be a vital response to what is becoming quite a crisis in our country.'

The Dementia Friendly Church programme began as a collaboration between Peter Kevern, Professor of Values in Health and Social Care at Staffordshire University and the Anglican Diocese of Lichfield in 2012.