Memory Clinics: Waiting Lists
(asked on 7th March 2025) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the average waiting time from referral to diagnosis has been for people being referred to memory assessment services in the last five years.
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.
The Government is committed to transforming diagnostic services, including the detection and diagnosis of dementia, and will support the National Health Service to increase capacity to meet the demand for diagnostic services. The Government and NHS England remain committed to recovering the dementia diagnosis rate to the national ambition of 66.7%.
The Dementia Care Pathway: Full Implementation Guidance, commissioned by NHS England, outlines the dementia care pathway and associated benchmarks to support improvements in the delivery and quality of care and support, for people living with dementia and their families and carers. The guide showcases good-practice examples of services that have successfully reduced their waiting times. Further information is available at the following link:
To support recovery of the dementia diagnosis rates and implementation of the Dementia Care Pathway, NHS England has developed a dashboard for management information purposes. The aim is to support commissioners and providers of memory services with appropriate data and enable targeted support where needed.