Amanda Robinson has worked for Halcyon Care Homes for around a year and what a year it’s been. As manager of Timken Grange Amanda has, in a short space of time transformed the home into a hub of the community. From offering blue light breakfasts and community involvement to organising out of the box events Amanda, along with her loyal team have blown the lid off the perception of social care and are demonstrating the Halcyon difference to the nth degree. Over the last few weeks our residents have become fire fighters for the day, taken pillion rides around the car park with the Rising Sun Riders and attended a celebrity football match. There is always something going on and it is never quite what you would expect.

Alongside her role as manager, Amanda is a passionate advocate for dementia care. Sadly, the number of people affected by this cruel disease is rising year on year and care home teams are learning more and more about the ways in which care can be adapted to offer a person-centred approach that allows people to live happy and fulfilling lives.

Amanda has studied hard and devotes much of her free time to keeping abreast of treatments and activities that benefit those with dementia and is always on hand to offer support and advice to families.

Working within dementia care highlights the lack of support and knowledge available to many and with this in mind Amanda set about spreading the knowledge that she has gained.

Amanda held a dementia workshop at the local GP surgery, addressing a room of professionals including nurses, doctors, and practice staff. The workshop was delivered in Amanda’s own inimitable style and was well received. The feedback, a sample of which is included below was wonderful and proved to Amanda what we already knew, there is a real need for improving dementia awareness and there are few more capable of delivering it than Amanda.

"Just to say all of the staff (Clinical and non-clinical) commented on what a fabulous presentation it was - everyone learnt something - Amanda's passion and knowledge came across and was well received by all. Can she come back.?"

"I liked that Amanda was really passionate about her role and working with patients with dementia and how she deals with "their" reality. I felt I came away with a greater understanding of what it is to have dementia and how to help people who have it. I am also going to say I think this was one of the best PLT's we have had. Informative and useful."

Following on from the success of the workshop, Amanda will now be running regular workshops at Timken Grange, the first being on Wednesday 27^th July from 2pm to 4pm. If you would like to learn more about dementia, about the symptoms to look out for and the many ways to support loved ones, do come along. It’s free, it won’t be dull and there will be cake.