You have eight weeks to get your two cents in.
Monash University is calling on healthcare professionals to contribute to the first major draft update to the 2016 Dementia Clinical Practice Guidelines and Principles of Care for People with Dementia.
The proposed update explores advances in dementia care over the past decade, such as new therapies and rehabilitation strategies, protecting brain health, driving assessments, opioid use and end-of-life communication.
It consists of 15 recommendations, including the appropriate use of 18-Fluoro-deoxy glucose Positron Emission Tomography (FDG-PET) and amyloid-PET for diagnosis, as well as biomarkers to both triage and confirm Alzheimer’s disease pathology for those with suspected dementia or mild cognitive impairment.
The proposed recommendations also advise against the use of donanemab or lecanemab for people diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment or mild dementia due to Alzheimer’s disease and suggest deprescribing cholinesterase inhibitors and memantine when the benefits are uncertain or no longer outweigh the risk of harm.
The update, commissioned by the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing in 2024, entered the public consultation phase on 11 May 2026. The multidisciplinary development group worked in consultation with a Living Experience Advisory Group comprising people with dementia and carers.
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The draft guidelines can be accessed here and an online form is available for submissions until 6 July 2026.
“The landscape of dementia care has shifted significantly since 2016, particularly with advances in diagnostics and emerging treatments – and this draft aims to ensure health professionals are equipped with the most current evidence to support their patients,” Professor Velandai Srikanth, Director of the National Centre for Healthy Ageing and co-chair of the update, told media.
The prevalence of dementia in Australia has been projected to grow from 425,000 this year to over 1.1 million by 2065. It accounts for $4.7 billion in health and aged care spending per year, with indirect costs expected to hit $9 billion within the next decade.
