When someone is living with dementia and experiences severe behaviours and psychological symptoms (BPSD), it can feel like the health care system has run out of options. Long hospital stays and constant distress take their toll on both the person and their family.

The national Specialist Dementia Care Program (SDCP) is offering hope. New HammondCare research, published in the Australasian Journal on Ageing, has found promising evidence that SDCP units are improving outcomes for people with the most complex needs.

‘The SDCP can help to address hospital bed availability through improved care options for people experiencing very severe BPSD,’ explains co-author Dr Thomas Morris.

HammondCare operates all seven SDCPs in New South Wales as well as sites in Caulfield, Victoria and Daw Park in South Australia, making us the nation’s largest provider of this model of care. With homelike cottages, small resident numbers and multidisciplinary teams practising person-centred care, residents living with BPSD are experiencing smoother transitions back to mainstream care, and less reliance on psychotropic medications.

For Portuguese-born Alfredo, the program reshaped his future.

'Alfredo spent more than 120 days in hospital, and no aged care home felt able to take him, but when we heard his story, we knew we had to help,’ recalls SDCP Manager Pratikshya Shrestha.

Alfredo arrived at HammondCare Cardiff’s Quintral Cottage SDCP in December 2023.
The experienced care team focused on reducing antipsychotic medication, addressing unmanaged pain, and creating a calm, homelike environment. Familiar activities like gardening gave him purpose again.

Slowly, Alfredo began to settle and enjoy daily life. 

‘The care he has been given there has certainly been special, it was a safe environment for
him,' his son Paulo said. ‘In his final years of life, he is comfortable.’

After more than a year at Quintral Cottage, Alfredo achieved a milestone his family never thought possible – he moved into a regular dementia care cottage. He died peacefully in June 2025, aged 79, leaving his family grateful that his final chapter was lived with dignity
and connection.

With 22 SDCP units open in 2024 and more on the way, research continues to explore how this model can inform national dementia care policy and practice. Referrals into SDCPs are coordinated by Dementia Support Australia, which undertakes specialist assessments using the National Behaviour Assessment (NBA) to determine eligibility.