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A new programme to support health and social care professionals, as well as the public, to better understand and support people with dementia at the end of life.
Delivered by:
Mary is an experienced community facilitator and researcher, and is interested in how people understand societal challenges and want to create change.
Mary has a PhD on how people perceive inequality and why they seek to change it, and has worked in charities, social innovation and change leadership programmes as well as on international research and action initiatives.
She currently leads a team of people creating participation opportunities, new initiatives and tackling societal challenges with community members and professionals in London.
Maaike graduated from the KATHO (Roeselare, Belgium) in 2002 as a general and mental health nurse. She started her professional career working on mental health A&E units in Belgium and then moved to Aruba (Caribbean) where she worked on a mental health A&E unit and the local prison. After working there for 3 years she moved back to Belgium and continued working in A&E and Nursing Homes.
Maaike moved to the UK in 2006 and has since worked in Nursing Homes and Greenwich & Bexley Community Hospice where she developed a palliative care service for care homes and then also developed and established an education department. Maaike has experience of working in palliative care, mental health, dementia, prison, care homes and education and has completed various post graduate education including a PGCert in Higher Education and a MA in Education.
Maaike has previously been seconded to the University of Greenwich as a senior lecturer and now works for St Christopher’s Hospice as Senior Educationalist where she alongside her senior leadership role leads on curriculum development and delivery.
We’re responding to what we see as a significant need for increased knowledge. Dementia is complex, especially at the end of life, and many people affected by dementia, including professionals, are reluctant to seek help and support or don’t know where to find it.
That’s why we’re combining our knowledge and experience of end of life of care with the expertise of our professional partners to develop an extensive range of learning opportunities and activities. The content we’re developing will help address many of the myths and misconceptions about this illness that is only increasing in prevalence.
The programme will include:
A six-part monthly webinar series featuring some of the UK’s most eminent dementia experts
A three-day introduction to dementia and end of life care course for nurses, Health Care Assistants and Allied Health Professionals working in any setting. This course will run in June and September and focus on the key issues affecting people with dementia as they approach the end of life
Dementia Study Days to take a deep-dive into some of the key challenges like communication, pain management, nutrition and hydration. Launching in January 2022.
The programme for the public will include:
An exhibition – Working with our Community Action Lead, Mary Hodgson, we’ll invite people with dementia and their carers to come into the Centre in the summer to create art works that express their experience of living with dementia. We’ll then exhibit the works in September
Learning from Living with Dementia – practical sessions for carers in our new high-tech Skills Lab
Dementia Podcast – hosted by Mary Hodgson and Maaike Vandeweghe, our Senior Educationalist, from the autumn, this regular podcast is designed to offer real solutions by interviewing both members of the public and professionals who’ll share their lived experience.
If you have any questions about this or any of our other courses, please contact the Education team who will be happy to help
At St Christopher's, a registered charity, it is important for us to maximise any surpluses to reinvest in the objectives of the charity.
Unfortunately, the manner in which we undertake our training currently means we are not able to invest as much of our surplus as possible, therefore from the 1 December 2017, St Christopher’s Education Centre will charge VAT at the standard rate on our training courses, the reason for this change in pricing is twofold:
i) We want to be able to reinvest any surpluses made from training back into all of our charitable objectives rather than only Education
ii) We want to be able to reclaim the VAT on costs relating to developing and running the training courses