Staff at a Burton care home have come up with an ingenious way of helping dementia sufferers. They are creating things, like an actual beach, and collecting memorabilia which will help often-confused and frightened sufferers.

Abacus Care Home, in Rolleston Road, is aiming to raise enough money to create an actual beach complete with sand outside the home as they feel it will help residents with the memory loss condition.

They are also aiming to collect items like old phone boxes and bus stops, all of which they say sufferers will find comforting.

Woman with dementia with her daughter (Getty)

Dementia patients often lose much of their short-term memory, but can remember things from their past, even their childhood, in detail. This is where items old-fashioned items like old red phone boxes and old-style bus stops can help as they are familiar.

The staff at the home are hoping the beach will transport patients back to happy times perhaps when they were children on holiday with their family by the seaside.

Staff say it is a case of not trying to force people to enter your world, but to embrace theirs instead.

Young woman helps a dementia victim (Getty)

It is also clear, as staff at the home say, that dementia is not just a condition associated with old age - it affects younger people too.

One thing is for sure, as we all live longer dementia is something that cannot be ignored. It is a terrible disease which robs people of their identity. It is something we have to get a handle on and projects like the Abacus one are leading the way.