When a person is living with a dementia-related condition it can have a significant effect on the ability to farm successfully. Dementia can seriously alter behaviour and has an impact on working patterns. There is also a safety concern on farms as they can be filled with hazards for the person living with dementia.
Since our attendance at the West Grinstead Ploughing Match in September our work with the Rural and Farming community has taken off.
At the Ploughing Match we were lucky to make contact with the chair of the local Farming Community Network (https://fcn.org.uk/ ). Sally has been fantastic and has introduced us to many other networks and organisations.
Sally suggested that we should attend the Hailsham Livestock Market which runs every Wednesday throughout the year. So today (6th December) we attended the Fatstock Show and we had a fab day with amazing conversations with people, networking and learning a bit more about farming life. The volunteers from the Farming Community Network were so kind to us and we set up next to them. This helped us to feel involved and we are going to visit on a regular basis, probably quarterly. We also caught up with the Westpoint farming vet’s representative. Moving forward we are going to be working with both Westpoint Vets and Sally from the Farming Community network to get our information available on their website and Facebook.
As part of the work, we have been doing with the Farming Community network we now have Alzheimer’s Society information on the Farmwell website https://farmwell.org.uk/dementia-2-2/
Dawn is also attending the local National Farmers Union AGM in December which is being held in Arundel. Dawn will man a stand at this event, but we are planning to be on the agenda next year where we will have the opportunity to talk about all aspects of dementia.
We have also been talking with the local National Farmers Union who have a membership of 20,000 people across the South and East. Their office is in Horsham, and we recently met with their chair. We are arranging to deliver two Dementia Awareness sessions in early February. The timing of these events is key as lambing starts around the middle of February. We have learnt that timing is key for farmers as their work is done over long hours and we need to take this into account. It also affects their ability to get an appointment at their GP and moving forward this is something we would like to highlight to any GP surgeries we work closely with.
In early January we shall be delivering two Dementia Friends sessions to the Farming Community Network and Arun to Adur Farming Group who are based in Steyning.
All this work came from a conversation over a cup of tea at Pulborough Garden Centre. We are working hard to get information out to as many people as possible within the rural and farming community.
If you know of any groups or organisations who would benefit from either a visit from ourselves or would like a talk please do introduce us to them.
