Building a dementia-friendly community is key to helping people living with dementia or Alzheimer’s.

That’s according to Shirley Lucas of the Alzheimer Society.

Approximately 75,000 Canadians are living with Alzheimer’s disease or another form of dementia.

Lucas says as the number of people living with dementia continues to rise, the importance of a dementia-friendly community becomes vital.

“The example I often give,” says Lucas, is in the supermarket. She says having an environment like the grocery store were there aren’t signs everywhere creating greater confusion. She says some people “may need some extra assistance at the checkout, so that people are supportive of those types of interactions…so that they don’t go in and feel they’ve forgotten something or that they’re not being encouraged by the staff to be able to process the transaction, those sort of things. “