Colleagues from across Trafford came together for a well-attended workshop at Trafford Town Hall as part of the second year of Greater Manchester’s Dementia and Brain Health Quality Standards programme. The session brought together partners from health, social care, voluntary and community services to focus on strengthening support for people living with dementia and their carers.
Driving consistency and quality across Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester has reviewed and refreshed its Greater Manchester Dementia and Brain Health Quality Standards. These 18 high-level standards set a shared vision for delivering high-quality, equitable dementia care. They have been designed to be adopted by localities, alongside the Dementia and Brain Health Delivery Plan 2023 to 2025, and to act as benchmarks to guide improvement and reform across the region.
To support implementation, Dementia United has been working closely with all ten boroughs to deliver a series of self-assessment workshops. Each locality is bringing together multi-agency teams to assess current practice against the standards and develop locally owned action plans that will shape their dementia strategies going forward.
Trafford’s commitment to improvement
Trafford has a strong history of partnership working to improve support for people affected by dementia, and the workshop offered an important opportunity to take stock together with Dementia United colleagues. The afternoon session focused on a structured self-assessment against the Greater Manchester dementia quality standards. This enable teams to identify strengths, gaps and priorities for their next phase of work.
Trafford continues to demonstrate its commitment to enhancing dementia care. The council and healthcare partners are currently refreshing their local dementia approach, ensuring it reflects the outcomes of this year’s workshop and remains aligned with regional priorities.
Notably, Trafford has made strong progress in improving diagnosis. Working with the memory assessment team and primary care the dementia diagnosis rate for people aged 65 and over increased from 66.4% in Jan 25 to 70.3% in November 2025, exceeding expectations and supporting earlier access to treatment and guidance.
Dementia is a major health priority, and there is a real, growing momentum to research medicines which can modify the progression of this disease, enhance the public awareness of prevention and embed practical support that improves quality of life for people and families now.
It’s so encouraging to see so many attend our group, especially those with lived experience and carers as well as professionals across our system, all with a shared interest in and motivation to improve dementia care in Trafford. We are reflecting on what has been achieved in 2025 with all your help and looking forward to setting priorities for 2026. Liz Clarke, Dementia Clinical Lead for Trafford
