A Walk for Alzheimer’s was held in Prince George Sunday afternoon to help raise money and awareness for the disease.
The annual event, put on by the Alzheimer’s Society of BC, is one of the largest fundraisers for this cause in the province.
It’s especially important in northern BC, says Support and Education, First Link Coordinator Sandra Meehan, due to how remotre and widespread the northern region is.
“The community is pretty spread out and can be a little bit isolated, living with dementia people sometimes do isolate themselves because there can be communication challenges,” she explains.
“So people sometimes isolate themselves and when you’re caregiving as well it can turn into quite a fulltime job.”
Prince George was one of 23 commnunities in the province putting on the walk. The overall fundraising goal for BC is one million dollars, currently the funds raised is over $850,000.
Nationally, the walk has raised $4,920,212.
The money goes back into the support and programs put on by the Society.
“We have support groups for caregivers, we have education that we offer quite regularly, we do a lot of supports,” Meehan explains.
“Support through a lot of calls through our First Link Program where once people are diagnosed, a healthcare professional can refer folks to us and we give them pretty regular calls.”
Each walk also has its own honouree each year. This year’s Prince George honouree was Victoria Taylor.