In May, Survation polled 382 GPs from England about the diagnosis and the monitoring of dementia.

The poll was completed online, with invitations to complete the survey sent out at random by email to GPs across all regions of England.

The Survey found that:

37% of GPs felt they had received sufficient basic training in diagnosis and management of dementia, although only 23% felt they had received sufficient post-qualification training in the area. 28% in each case felt they definitely had not received adequate basic or post qualification training, with GPs in the South of England reporting the highest level of dissatisfaction with training in both cases (33% for basic training, 34% for post-qualification training).

When  asked  how  confident  they  are  about  diagnosing  someone  with  dementia  or Alzheimer’s disease, 79% said confident to some extent- with 22% saying ‘confident’ and 58% saying ‘fairly confident’. 15% replied that they are ‘not confident’. And when asked what the barriers are to diagnosis, 66% of GPs said ‘the stigma attached to mental health and dementia’, 65% said ‘many people with dementia do not present to General Practice’, 53% replied ‘a lack of support services for people following diagnosis’, 35%  said  ‘lack  of  training  for  GPs  on  dementia’,  33%  said  ‘a  lack  of  suitable  drug treatments’, 23% replied ‘no local memory clinic’ or ‘long waits at the memory clinic’.

13%  of  GPs  said  ‘all  the  time’ when asked whether they tell their patients about the support they can receive from Alzheimer’s  Society. 33% replied ‘often’, 28% said ‘sometimes’, 20% said ‘rarely’ and 6% replied ‘never’.

Full details of the findings are available in our report, which also features full cross-tabs of the poll.

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