Community Radio Dementia Awareness Project

The Community Radio Dementia Awareness Project was developed in partnership with Alzheimer’s Australia. The project developed a series of audio messages about dementia for hard-to-reach remote and/or Indigenous communities, as well as the large groups of older people who listen to community radio around the country. Importantly, the project also reached large numbers of young people around Australia, helping to build their awareness of dementia and younger onset dementia, and to break down the stigma surrounding dementia. 

The CBAA Community Education team successfully developed a series of twelve 60-second radio segments providing a large national audience around the country (including an estimated 57% of all Australians aged 15 and over) with information on dementia, including information focusing on:

• Promoting the national dementia helpline, and the website and services of Alzheimer’s Australia
• An early intervention approach to dementia, including promoting the importance of recognising the warning signs of dementia and seeking help to find out more
• Promoting the importance of seeking help and assistance to manage dementia (especially for people in rural and remote communities)
• Promoting the support that is available to provide people with dementia and their carers with the confidence they need to stay safe and engaged at home
• Promoting greater awareness of dementia and reduction of the stigma surrounding dementia among young people
• Promoting greater awareness of younger onset dementia
• Ways people can ‘mind their minds’ and reduce their risk of developing dementia

These programs were promoted and broadcast via both satellite and digital delivery to over 270 radio stations around Australia, including a large number of stations in rural and regional areas of the country and Indigenous radio stations. The broadcasts occurred over a six-month period to ensure the information reached, and was retained by, a large national audience. The audio segments were also packaged with printed information on dementia, and distributed to all community and Indigenous media outlets.

The project was evaluated using a survey of radio stations, which measured how many stations were using project material locally and the feedback they had received from their local listening audiences. The survey found that:

• 97% used audio segments in their local broadcasts at least three times a week
• 94% used audio segments in their local broadcasts at least four times a week
• 84% of stations used the printed project material to remind listeners of project content (such as phone numbers)
• 50% of stations actively discussed the issues and services profiled in the audio segments with their local audience
• 66% of stations received positive feedback from their local community 
• 50% of stations reported phone calls from listeners to request phone numbers or other information after hearing project audio on-air