Proposed day care closures in Glasgow

The prospect of six Glasgow day care centres closing is about much more than buildings or budgets. For people living with dementia and the families who support them, day care can be an essential part of how they continue to live well in their own communities.

For this reason, Alzheimer Scotland has urged Glasgow City Integration Joint Board members to think very carefully before agreeing the proposed closures as part of the “STEP Forward” programme, which aims to save the Health and Social Care Partnership £20m by April 2027 due to “increasingly challenging” funding pressures.

Our concern is not based on a view that existing services should never change but on evidence. Alzheimer Scotland’s 2025 research report, Dementia Day Care Matters, found that good quality, person-centred day care provides people with dementia with companionship, purpose, meaningful activity, social connection and opportunities to maintain independence. For families and carers, it provides respite, peace of mind and practical support.

The benefits are not only social. Day care can help people remain at home for longer, reduce avoidable hospital admissions and delay or prevent admission to residential care. The report is clear: day care is a preventative service that helps address problems before they become crises.

With public services across Scotland under significant financial pressure, the health-economic case for preventative approaches is unignorable. Our research found average weekly costs of around £176 for local authority day care, compared with £1,672 for nursing home care, and £454-£655 for a single hospital day. Not every hospital or care home admission can be prevented, but these figures demonstrate why only looking at the immediate cost of closing a service can miss the much greater costs that might arise elsewhere in the system.

Glasgow is not starting from a position of abundant provision. Dementia Day Care Matters estimated that around 10,535 people were living with dementia in Glasgow, alongside 396 registered day care places each day. Even before the proposed closures, that figure represents only a small proportion of potential need.

In response, Alzheimer Scotland has written directly to the elected representatives who sit on the Glasgow City IJB, asking them to oppose closures unless equivalent or better provision can be demonstrated for everyone currently using the services. We are also asking that any decision is tested against the evidence in Dementia Day Care Matters, including its findings about the preventative and economic value of day care.

Importantly, we are asking for people with dementia and family carers to be meaningfully involved in decisions about the future of these services. Our research was developed with people with dementia and carers and found that day care users and families provide crucial evidence about the wide-ranging benefits attributable to day care services.

The proposed closure of day care services is contrary to the approach advocated for in Alzheimer Scotland’s manifesto, the Dementia Care Pathway Guarantees. The Guarantees are based on the principle that people should receive the right support early enough to prevent deterioration and crisis – including specialist therapeutic day services, respite for carers, care coordination and community-based support.

Closing community infrastructure such as day care risks moving us in the opposite direction: away from prevention and towards crisis.

Alzheimer Scotland is therefore not calling for Glasgow to simply preserve what exists but to strengthen and integrate day care as part of a consistent dementia care pathway.

The question for the IJB is: will this decision make it easier or harder for people with dementia and their carers to remain well, connected and supported at home?

This is the test that should accompany the immediate financial calculation.