Learn how to reduce your dementia risk - enrol in our online course

My name is Dr Maree Farrow and I am a Senior Lecturer and Academic Lead for the Preventing Dementia MOOC. I’m delighted to be part of the research team for the ISLAND Project, and my research focuses on understanding the most effective ways to educate people in the community about how they can reduce their risk of developing dementia. 

Over a number of years, we’ve helped many thousands of people understand and hopefully address their own dementia risk through our Preventing Dementia Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) and we’re proud to say that it’s ranked as one of the top health and medical MOOC courses in the world!  

With our ageing population and projected increases in the number of people living with dementia, we want to make as many people as we possibly can aware of the type of action they can take to reduce their risk of dementia. Risk reduction can delay the onset of dementia and reduce the number of people affected. Our Preventing Dementia MOOC investigates the best available evidence about dementia prevention, and feedback from participants suggests that people change their behaviour to reduce their dementia risk after doing the MOOC. We also have evidence that people maintain those healthy changes into the future! The course is free and designed to be completed by people from all backgrounds.  

To obtain the most from this course, participants should expect to spend approximately 2 hours per week engaging with the content and completing related course activities. The 4 weeks of scheduled content is released weekly and is accessible across 6 weeks in total, with the additional 2 weeks providing time to catch up on (or review) content. After successfully completing the final quiz, participants will be eligible to download a certificate of completion. 

We’d like to invite you to complete our October 2021 Preventing Dementia MOOC to improve your knowledge of dementia risk reduction and so we can ensure that our ISLAND Participants are informed about how to best manage their risk of dementia. The course material is regularly updated so even if you have done the Preventing Dementia MOOC before you are welcome to join us again to refresh your knowledge.  

Enrol in the Preventing Dementia MOOC via your ISLAND Home page.

Log in or sign up here to access this free course.

Celebrating our Expo and our fabulous volunteers

Thank you to the hundreds of people across the North West coast who came to our Devonport expo - it was great to see so many of our participants and members of the local community at the fabulous paranaple convention centre. Thanks also to all our exhibitors for coming to support us. It was a great success and hopefully we can do it again soon.

A million thanks to our volunteers - you were amazing and there was so much that would not have been done without your help. Everyone in the ISLAND team appreciates your time and kindness very much.   

Come and say hello to the ISLAND Project team!

Our ISLAND Project team will be out in the community in the coming weeks.  If you're in the area, pop into the venues below and say hi to Adam and Helen!  They will be speaking with members of the local community about ISLAND and how others can join our study and make a contribution to dementia prevention research.

• TRIABUNNA - Monday October 11th from 11:30am at Triabunna Pharmacy, Vickery Street

• SWANSEA - Wednesday October 13th from 11am at May Shaw Centre, Wellington Street

• BICHENO - Wednesday October 13th from 2pm at Bicheno Pharmacy, Burgess Street

• SORELL - Thursday October 14th from 11:30am at the Sorell Library, Cole Street

• FINGAL - Tuesday October 19th at 11:30am at Fingal Integrated Living, Talbot Street

• ST MARYS - Tuesday October 19th from 1:30pm at St Marys Pharmacy, Main Street

• ST HELENS - Tuesday October 19th from 3:30pm at the St Helens Library, Cecilia Street

• SCOTTSDALE - Wednesday October 20th from 11am at Northbourne Park Retirement Village, Northbourne Avenue

• GEORGE TOWN - Wednesday October 20th from 1:30pm at the George Town Library, Elizabeth Street

• BEACONSFIELD - Thursday October 21st from 10am at West Tamar Pharmacy, Weld Street

Seniors Week - 11 - 17 October

"discover. imagine. together" - is the tagline for Seniors Week 2021 and this year's  theme.... FRIENDSHIP.

Find an activity of interest from the 380 events in the Seniors Week program, which is also available at Australia Post, Service Tas, council offices, community houses and your local library.  Seniors Week runs from Monday 11th October to Sunday 17th October.

Reminder - ISLAND Annual Surveys are coming!

From next week (11th October) ISLAND research participants will be emailed an invitation to undertake ISLAND annual surveys. This is a core research activity that enables us to track changes that may have occurred over time.  The surveys are integral to our research and we thank you in advance for your time and efforts to do the surveys.  

The University of Tasmania received funding from the Australian Government. Views and conclusions expressed in this publication are those of its authors, and may not be the same as those held by the Department of Health.

CRICOS Provider Code: 00586B | ABN 30 764 374 782