National Dementia Action Plan – Response to the Consultation Paper

This submission to the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care responds to the National Dementia Action Plan consultation paper, focusing on Objective 7: improving dementia data and maximising the impact of dementia research and innovation. Research Australia broadly agrees with the proposed data actions but asks that the national dementia data framework be designed from the outset to improve research access to data. It recommends that the proposed Australian dementia research strategy build on documents produced by the NHMRC National Institute for Dementia Research, funded in 2014 under the five-year $200 million Boosting Dementia Research Initiative, including its strategic roadmap and its culturally and linguistically diverse and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander research plans. Using the example of a clinical trial of a new model of care in residential aged care, it maintains that a research clearing house and attention to knowledge translation will not be enough, because implementation work is funded by neither the NHMRC nor the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF). It proposes an ‘Australian Dementia Research, Innovation and Implementation Strategy’ with clearly assigned accountability and funding for implementation. Noting existing MRFF investment of $185 million over ten years through its Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission and NHMRC dementia grants of $53.8 million in 2021–22, it maintains that relying on current funding arrangements will not increase research, and recommends concrete actions to increase dementia research funding.