People are living longer and thus the risk of developing some form of dementia in old age is increasing. Put like this, the future for elderly people is gloomy. The media doesn’t help, feeding us with sad stories of decline and the consequent stress it imposes on carers.
But it doesn’t have to be like this. Indeed, I was heartened recently in reading Dementia: Hope on a Difficult Journey, by Dr Adrian Treloar (Redemptorist Publications). Dr Treloar, a consultant and senior lecturer in old-age psychiatry, is also a Catholic and writes “from that perspective”. Nonetheless, he would like his book to offer help to readers of other faiths.
