As Alzheimer Awareness Month comes to an end, officials at the Alzheimer Society of Chatham-Kent are reassuring families affected by dementia that there is help.
CEO Brandon Ball says the agency offers a variety of services and programs for those living with the disease so they and their families don’t have to suffer in silence.
“Especially during COVID, so many people sitting at home in silence helping a care partner, it’s exhausting,” Ball says. “We have in-home respite services, we have day programs in Chatham and Wallaceburg, there’s social workers that are on site that to assessments, and we’ve got education always provided throughout the community.”
Attendance at the day program in Wallaceburg has declined over the last year or so coming out of the pandemic, but Ball says the service is there to help those who need it.
“Sending a loved one, a client, to a day program and they get to spend the day having a great social time. They do physical activities and they promote that brain health and those sorts of things that really are very important to anyone going thorough any sort of experience with dementia.”
Ball says day programs serve as a much-needed break for caregivers so they can do their regular day-to-day activities without having to worry.
Information on the day program and other services can be found by contacting the Alzheimer Society of Chatham-Kent by calling 519-352-1043 or emailing info@alzheimerchathamkent.ca.
Meantime, the Alzheimer Society is preparing for its largest annual fundraiser with the Walk for Alzheimer’s coming up in May. More details on that event will be released in the next few months.