PARIS – The Paris Police Department is offering a Safe Return Program to help people suffering from dementia or Alzheimer’s Disease from 1 to 3 p.m. Saturday in the auditorium at Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School.

The event is part of Alzheimer’s Awareness Month now being observed nationwide.

The officers will register persons with dementia and give them an identification bracelet, a wallet I.D. card, clothing labels and a key chain.

A family member may provide the information on behalf of the person with dementia. They are asked to bring a recent photo of the person with dementia and come prepared to give a physical description of the person.

There is a fee of $40 for each registration, but all are welcome regardless of ability to pay.

“It is difficult to predict when a person with Alzheimer’s disease will begin wandering. Most caregivers do not think it will happen to their loved one, but it does,” said Peg Gagnon, outreach specialist for the Maine Alzheimer’s Association.

The Alzheimer’s Association Safe Return Program is the only national computerized registry of persons with dementia that helps locate, identify and return individuals with Alzheimer’s and related disorders who wander and become lost. Safe Return matches lost person I.D. numbers or descriptions with caregivers registered in the system. They help in the search of a missing person by working with local law enforcement.

Gagnon said a missing person with Alzheimer’s or dementia is always an emergency. About 46 percent of those not located within 24 hours of the time last seen die, usually succumbing to hypothermia or dehydration.

For more information, call Gagnon at 1-800-660-2871.

Copy the Story Link