Call for more care for an ageing population

Dr Lesley Wilson, said that the focus of senior management at Health and Social Services seemed to be on other areas. The memory clinic comes under the control of Health and Social Services. ‘My impression is that senior management are focused on surgical waiting lists. That is highly laudable, people should not be waiting in pain for surgery, but a great deal of money and effort has been directed there and not towards services for older adults generally. ‘I suspect that we compare favourably with the UK but we have not had real growth in the service for about five years but our catchment population goes up yearly by about three per cent,’ said Dr Wilson. ‘One thing that I do stress is that there appears to be the belief in some quarters that the ageing population is going to happen in the future but it is something that is happening now and we are living with it now.’