East Riding JSNA

Health and Wellbeing Assessment in the East Riding

Dementia

Introduction and Headlines

Dementia prevalence has risen in the East Riding over the last decade, projections show that this rise will continue into the future. During the period April 2025 to April 2026 Hull and East Riding Memory Assessment Services have experienced a 24% rise in referrals. This can be related to increased awareness of Dementia and the possible benefit of early diagnosis following increased media coverage re treatment. Additionally approach in after care has focussed on building peer support to live a healthier more supported life with Dementia.

What is dementia?

According to the Alzheimer’s Society, dementia describes a set of symptoms that over time can affect memory, problem-solving, language and behaviour”. It is not a specific disease, but a result of various conditions that damage the brain, such as Alzheimer’s disease, vascular dementia, Lewy body dementia, and frontotemporal dementia. Dementia is progressive, meaning it gets worse over time, and there is no cure. However, some treatments and interventions can help manage the symptoms and improve the quality of life of people with dementia and their carers.

Insight

The direction for dementia in the county is upward, with those 65 and over with dementia increasing by near 10,000 people by 2040 and mere 17 years into the future. What is most stark is that this a 60% increase on the 2020 prevalence, applying that demand to the same services to support individuals would likely be overwhelming economically. Changing how we support people with this condition is a must.

The Alzheimer’s Society report (May 2023) “Improving access to a timely and accurate diagnosis of dementia in England, Wales and Northern Ireland” highlights the barriers people living with dementia face in accessing a timely and accurate dementia diagnosis, and advocates for practical changes and tangible solutions.

The report can be accessed by clicking this link: ‘Improving access to a timely and accurate diagnosis of dementia in England, Wales and Northern Ireland’,

The Need

Prevalence of Dementia across the East Riding has been rising steadily over the last decade. This is not unexpected with the area having an ageing population. The experience of people shielding during the pandemic created additional challenges for people living with dementia and had an impact on accessing services, contributing to cognitive decline through reductions in diagnosis, support and social isolation. Work is ongoing across the system to improve diagnosis rates and ensure that people have access to appropriate support and information pre, during and post diagnosis. Voluntary Sector providers incorporate co-production into the community support on offer for people living with dementia and their supporters. Community development approaches with a range of VCSE organisations and groups are aiming to improve outreach to isolated rural and coastal communities to raise awareness, encourage people to come forward for early diagnosis and sustain community support across localities.

The Projecting Older People Information System (POPPI) has made projections for the estimated number of people (aged 65+ years) with dementia for all local authorities within England. Figures relating specifically to the East Riding can be viewed below.

The embedded Microsoft PowerBI dashboard, below, features indicators related to dementia sourced from OHID Fingertips

Service Usage

Below is an interactive dashboard of dementia activity in the East Riding. The dashboards contain the diagnosis rate of dementia, grouped by primary care networks and general practices. In addition trend information of diagnosis rates overtime.

The numbers estimated to be missing a diagnosis are calculated using a national prevalence model, based on the population aged 65 and over. Within the East Riding PCNs, the number of undiagnosed patients range from just over 40 to 118.

Lived Experience Locality Insights

The Dementia Inclusion Network held a focused session in Bridlington on 7th May 2026 holding two separate conversations, one with a group of people with dementia and the other, their care partners. The aim being to provide lived experience insight to inform Brain Health work with Bridlington Neighbourhood Health Partnership.  Notes, quotes and themes from these two perspectives are presented in the following documents:

Assets

  • Assets map: showing charitable organisations located within the East Riding of Yorkshire. The map can be zoomed into and each coloured element can be clicked on to reveal what kind of asset it is.

Dementia Voices co-produced information

This section provides some co-produced information relating to dementia, click on any of the bullet points to access the information.

Resources

Tags: Adult, Health and Social Care Services, Individual behaviours