Report outlines rehabilitative dementia care roadmap

Alzheimer’s Disease International, the University of Exeter and the University of Sydney have released the co-authored World Alzheimer Report 2025 Reimagining life with dementia – the power of rehabilitation.

Released on 18 September in the lead up to World Alzheimer’s Day three days later and the end of Dementia Action Week, the report highlights the importance of rehabilitation for people living with dementia.

Through a combination of expert essays and real-world international case studies, the report presents a global and practical roadmap for reimagining life with dementia through rehabilitation and tailored goal-oriented approaches that can help people maintain function, independence and participation across different settings and stages.

Key findings include:

• rehabilitation is a person-centred, collaborative approach to care enabling people with dementia to maintain or rebuild skills, from preparing meals and shopping to mobility, speech, and self-care
• 65 per cent of existing national dementia plans mention rehabilitation but 75 per cent of World Health Organisation member states have no national dementia plan 
• despite its benefits, people with dementia rarely have access to rehabilitation
• specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound, SMART, goals are part of an effective rehabilitation approach 
• studies have shown that people who had engaged in tailored individual cognitive rehabilitation had lower levels of disability than people who had received only standard care, and remained in their own homes for six months longer than average
• at least one in three people globally will need rehabilitation for a health condition at some point in their lives but in lower and middle-income countries, more than half who need it don’t receive it
• the WHO’s Rehabilitation 2030 initiative has supported work to strengthen rehabilitation in approximately 80 countries since 2017, with a goal of 100 by 2030 
• seizures are up to seven times more common in people with dementia compared with peers of the same age, while falls that cause injury are two to three times more common for people living with dementia but modifications to the lived environment can reduce certain risks and empower people to be more confident in continuing to carry out activities of daily living
• informal care accounts for roughly half of global dementia costs, underscoring the value of approaches that maintain independence.

The report demonstrates the ways people diagnosed with dementia are missing out on important post diagnostic services needed to live well, said Dementia Australia chief executive officer Tanya Buchanan.

“This is just one of the reasons Dementia Australia is pushing for the federal government to provide funding for dementia navigators to help people access the services they need to live well. When it comes to dementia, nobody can do it alone,” Professor Buchanan said.

“The second thing this report demonstrates is the profound lack of understanding of dementia and the important role rehabilitation plays in improving the lives of people living with dementia, their families and carers. It is another example of why we need to improve Australians’ understanding of dementia and brain health.”

The report also includes eight recommendations for improving rehabilitation access for people living with dementia.

1. rehabilitation should be embedded within national dementia plans and implemented
2. dementia is considered a disability under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and as such, rehabilitation should be a right
3. rehabilitation should be embraced as part of precision care
4. rehabilitative care should be seen as a continuum of good practices that can be tailored to different resource contexts
5. more implementation research and evaluation is needed, particularly on real-world practice and implementation research on the benefits of integrating rehabilitation
6. the economic impact and cost-saving impact on how improved functionality through rehabilitation extends independence and delays hospital and residential care admissions needs to be measured
7. rehabilitation needs to be normalised, and governments should be encouraged to invest in healthcare systems that integrate it into the regular care pathway
8. carers should be educated on the importance of rehabilitation, its principles, the role they can play and should enjoy the benefits of rehabilitation.

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