Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to help improve early diagnosis of non-memory led dementias including primary progressive aphasia in Surrey.

A timely diagnosis is vital to ensuring that a person with dementia can access the advice, information, care, and support that can help them to live well and remain independent for as long as possible.

As part of development of the Modern Service Framework for Frailty and Dementia, we will consider what interventions should be supported to improve dementia care and diagnosis waiting times, which we know are too long in many areas. We are considering all options to improve care and help reduce variation, including reviewing metrics and targets.

We remain committed to recovering the dementia diagnosis rate to the national ambition of 66.7%. The national ambition to ensure that two-thirds of people estimated to have dementia receive a formal diagnosis includes ensuring provision of a validated diagnosis of dementia subtype.