During the Summer I returned to the care home in Akarp, near to Lund and Malmo about which I have written articles in the Journal of Residential Care and Journal of Healthcare Assistants over the last 2 years.

The manager contacted me recently as she had something to tell me. She was the winner of the scholarship this year- Svenskt demenscentrum gives up to 100000 Swedish Krona to the best leader in a carehome for dementia!

She told me ‘this money will be used on education and other important stuff for the winner. I will go abroad and learn from other countries. Maybe I will go to England!!

I am hoping that this will be possible too. I think Ewa would make a refreshing practitioner speaker to an English care home conference.

When I turned up at the care home I was warmly greeted by the staff but found myself unexpectedly in the middle of an award ceremony. This was an award provided by a law firm who is sponsoring students to come over from Chernobyl for 2 week blocks using a tech translation system, to take back best practice into their country.

I learnt that the award funding is being spent on training all staff in advanced dementia care from the University of Texas.

The staff member I interviewed showed palpable excitement about this prospect with a hunger to learn which is the beginning of the Learning Care Home. This particular home is linked to local domiciliary care ‘under nurses’ a 3 year trained workforce who work between hospitals, care homes and domiciliary care as the primary workforce. This type of status afforded to staff working in complex environments is to me the right way forward.