Speaker Rotarian Mrs Sheila Wainwright - 'Who Cares'

Sheila started off by asking how many members had heard of Admiral Nurses. Few had and she went on to explain that they were named after Joe Levy who was nicknamed Admiral because of his love of sailing. He died of vascular dementia and his family then set up a charity Dementia UK in his memory with the charity's nurses named after him. For more information about the charity see www.dementiauk.org

She then asked how many members had had friends or relations that had been affected by dementia and the vast majority of members had come in contact with the diseases that make up this category of illness. Sheila explained that her Rotarian husband had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s dementia at the age of 59. He started to become withdrawn, confused and irritable. From here he became more violent and even threw her out of the house in the middle of the night as well as threatening her with a chair. After one episode of violence he threw himself on the sofa and the pet cat went over and jumped on his knee. Sheila was worried that he would hurt the cat but in fact he started stroking it and it calmed him down.

It seemed impossible to get the professional help that he needed. Somebody did suggest Admiral nurses but there are only a very limited number of them around the country. Eventually Sheila's husband became so violent that he was sectioned and committed to hospital. He died in hospital 7 years ago with bed sores and septicaemia.

After his death Sheila decided that something needed to be done to get support both for people with dementia and also their carers. She contacted Dementia UK and found that they were only a small charity and they were the only source of Admiral nurses. So she decided to try to raise £10,000 to fund an Admiral nurse for Wakefield. Having raised the money she contacted the NHS about getting an Admiral nurse for the area but they said no. So she continued raising funds until after 4 years she had raised £30,000. Finally, an Admiral nurse was appointed for Wakefield. Since then her fundraising has totalled £120,000 and there are now 2 nurses in Wakefield.

On a lighter note she mentioned a couple of anecdotes during her journey of raising money. First was a sportsman dinner at Leeds United where there were about 350 present and she was very nervous about giving a talk to them all. But after the talk they had an auction to raise money and the item auctioned was a small pork pie which was eventually sold for £350. At another sportsman's dinner she had been asked to attend to pick up a cheque for the charity she was asked to go on the stage without knowing why. As she stood there by herself the curtains pulled back to reveal Frank Bruno who announced himself by saying "I've been sectioned". Then at a tea party for 120 elderly people she was asked to attend to pick up a cheque for £2,000. Again, she was asked to go on the stage and 2 drag artists came out and said she had to work for the cheque and made her sing with them "Shake your bosom 1 2 3. See if you can shake it just like me". So she did and got her cheque.

She did another talk from the pulpit at St George's church in Leeds before an audience of 600. Other speakers at the event were Derek Jacobi and Prue Leith. She had told Derek Jacobi how nervous she was, and he said that he was too. This surprised her but he explained that he usually couldn't see the audience in a theatre and on television he was just speaking into a camera. As she came out of the pulpit a man from Texas approached her and said he would like to buy an Admiral nurse what does it cost? She had told him £40,000 and she introduced him to a manager from Dementia UK thinking that he was all talk. But, actually, he was a member of the Huntsman oil family who are reputed to be worth more than £3 billion and he did in fact send the £40,000 and said he would send another £40,000 the next year if his investment worked out well.

2 years ago Sheila came across some robotic cats whilst attending a seminar in Huddersfield. There were 5 cats on the table that purred, meowed and moved and she thought about the calming effect that the pet cat had had on her husband. So she got the Rotary Club of Wakefield (where she is a member and 2 times past president) to buy some cats to give to people in care homes or who are isolated in their own home and are suffering from dementia. She joined a BBC contest to try to get funding for cats but was beaten by a man from Ossett with a different project. However, the national exposure brought in an email from somebody who had seen the programme and sent her £3,000 - £2,000 for cats and £1,000 for Admiral nurses.

Wakefield Rotary have now given out 68 cats and have more in stock to give out. They try to get recipients to either donate or be sponsored towards the cost of a cat so that they can then buy more cats in bulk from the USA manufacturer. She is hoping to get every Rotary Club in the country to donate to sponsor one cat.