You don’t need to spend long in Purley to realise the town is home to many elderly people. The otherwise unremarkable suburb of Croydon is surrounded by numerous residential care homes, and in Purley Library, staff are used to adapting to the needs of elderly visitors.
While the older generation adds much to the town’s community and economy, there are occasional issues: visitors from the local care homes often forget where they are or what they are looking for. “We’ve had two already this morning,” one librarian says on a Friday afternoon in January.
In 2012, Croydon determined that 3,300 residents of the borough are living with dementia, above the London average, and set to rise to 4,500 by 2025. So when Purley Bid, the business improvement district, held a meeting to discuss measures to improve the town, much centred on finding new ways to support the elderly population. Dementia is also a growing problem in the UK. The Alzheimer’s Society believes it will affect more than 1 million residents by 2025.
You can find more following the link below, recently published article about work of Purley Business Improvement District team in the national press
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/feb/02/purley-uk-latest-dementia-friendly-community?CMP=twt_gu
If you would like to find out more how your business can become Dementia friendly, please contact events@inpurley.london