The aim of the research group is to reduce the personal and societal burden of dementia approaches in order to bring down the numbers of people getting dementia in the future, and to develop more efficient postdiagnostic care. The group will collaborate with dementia experts in public health and primary care at the Universities of Newcastle, Kings College London, and partners in low and middle income (LMIC) areas of Tanzania, Malaysia and India to create a global, multi-disciplinary translational research group.
Louise Robinson, Director of Newcastle University’s Institute for Ageing and Professor of Primary Care and Ageing, is leading the specialist team.
Health priority
Dementia, a health priority around the world, has a disproportionately large impact on low and middle-income families. In the absence of a cure, and without a future strategy to reduce the risk and improve care after a diagnosis, dementia will have a devastating societal and economic effect.
The Newcastle University team will bring together expertise in public health and primary care, with global epidemiological research, to create a NIHR Global Health Research Group on dementia prevention and enhanced care.
Professor Robinson, said: “With age the biggest risk factor for dementia, the world’s rapidly ageing populations make dementia a global challenge for all.
“Establishing a NIHR Global Health Group on dementia care and prevention provides us with a fabulous opportunity to collaborate with our colleagues in lower middle-income countries – such as Egypt, Ukraine and Cambodia – to develop global, as opposed to national, solutions to the dementia challenge.”
Professor Louise Robinson, who is also an NIHR Professor, was recently announced as an NIHR Senior Investigator.