Last year we had two memorable events that we can be proud of. First was the Asia Pacific conference of ADI, held at the India Habitat centre in Delhi and the second was the Kerala State Initiative on Dementia. The latter is the first public private partnership for dementia care and awareness in the state of Kerala. We have started the first dementia residential care centre at Edavankadu and a day care centre at Kottapady. Efforts are on to start memory clinics and massive distribution of IEC materials have been made throughout Kerala. Credit should be given to the members of the Trivandrum chapter, specially Mr. Sreekanth for mooting this idea and then persevering with it for a couple of years to get the MOU signed. This will be an ideal model to be replicated in other states.
The Executive Director, Mr. R Narendhar is ready with a 3 year action plan which will be the road map for ARDSI to achieve the objectives listed in the plan. The chapters have a big part in this as they are the representatives of the national office in the various states to serve the needs of persons with dementia. I urge all the chapters to take this seriously and together we can move forward and expand our activities. Since funding continues to be one of the big challenges that we have been trying to overcome for so many years, now the national office is embarking on a plan to garner support from the corporate sector to support our cause in a big way.
September being World Alzheimer's month is the right time to create awareness, spread the message, start new service facilities and impress upon the central and state governments to recognise dementia as a health priority. Several exciting plans have been made to observe World Alzheimer's Day across the country In Kerala, in association with the Social Justice department, there will be a state wide yathra and campaign 'I am a Dementia Friend'.
Let me conclude by inviting you all to the national conference of ARDSI to be held at Mumbai on the 4th and 5th of December 2015, which is being hosted by the Mumbai Chapter of ARDSI.
