Dementia Friendly East Lothian started with a conversation between carers about the challenges of supporting family members living with dementia. We talked about our strategies for dealing with the challenges of daily life and getting formal help and support. We soon discovered the value of practical and emotional support from people ‘in the same boat’.

Carers spoke to other carers and the conversation spread across East Lothian with support and encouragement from local day centres, community centres, and partner organisations—thank you. As we shared experience, laughter, and friendship, our network grew and we organised county-wide Gatherings, bringing together people with lived experience, communities, practitioners, and researchers as equal partners to shape decisions that affect our lives.

Gatherings and conversations with local Area Partnerships and Health and Wellbeing groups provided a supportive space for our ideas to flow and grow, and productive partnerships to turn ideas into action.

Grounded in the daily reality of dementia, we brought people living with dementia, carers, and public services together as equal partners to design and deliver support focused on what genuinely works in practice. Co-production provided a tool for collective action with policy makers and services, applying the Christie Commission principles of people, place, and partnership to create real change.

We helped co-produce the East Lothian Dementia Strategy and championed the evidence-based Meeting Centre model—opening the Musselburgh Meeting Centre to show how community connection, peer support, and cognitive stimulation transform daily life. Based on people wanting to stay in touch after the ‘Memory Course’, we set up informal peer-led Friendship Groups. We worked with community organisations including Support from the Start and schools to support their visions for intergenerational working. We also and developed training and inclusive activities—from creative arts and shared meals to dementia-friendly movement and dance—ensuring ordinary community life remains open and joyful for everyone.

Looking ahead, we want to keep building what works and the core principles that have served us so well: prioritising experts by experience and communities of place and interest coming together as equal partners to learn and share together round things that matter to them.

There’s a growing interest and collective energy round Brain Health across the whole lifespan—how our brains work and how we’re all different. Our most recent Gathering, ‘Nourishing Our Neurones’, generations came together to learn about brains and how we can look after them. It was a day full of fun and creative. A focus on Brain Health opens inclusive conversations, connections and curiosity. We now share. Through our website, Gatherings, and collaborative events, we will continue to learn, laugh, and turn ideas into action together.