TV star Fiona Phillips opens Shropshire dementia care home

During a visit to a new care home, she spoke of the vital importance of given people suffering with Alzheimer's disease the best care available.

Her mother Amy fell victim to the degenerative condition in her 50s and suffered a slow decline until her death in 2006, aged 74.

Then in a cruel twist of fate, just months after his wife's death, Fiona's father, Neville, affectionately known as Phil, received the devastating diagnosis that he too had the condition.

Fiona said over-medication turned him from "a big upright man to being stooped right over, shuffling around, dribbling" before his death last year aged 76.

She said: "The lack of understanding of dementia is appalling. When you are dumped in that situation with parents with Alzheimer's you just learn by mistakes. It splits families – it's like a bomb."

Fiona said alarm bells started ringing when she noticed changes in her mother's behaviour.

"First of all she started behaving oddly, we all think our mothers are a bit eccentric, but her behaviour wasn't right," she said. "At first we thought it was the menopause or depression, as she was only in her 50s. Eventually we found out it was early onset Alzheimer's which was devastating because you slowly and painfully over years lose the person they once were.

"My mum couldn't operate her own bank account, she couldn't count money out. I just remember being really cross with her and I feel so guilty now."

While battling to understand her mother's problems, Fiona noticed her father was also acting out of character.

"I was caring for them both as well as having two babies and a full-time job where I was practically getting up in the middle of the night."

She remembered the emotional moment she found out by chance, that her mother had dementia, after discovering she was visiting a day centre.

"She was never properly diagnosed," said Fiona. "The lack of understanding is appalling and it starts in the GP surgery. Mum had been visiting her GP for years saying something was wrong. Her GP had told her but she had forgotten. That's the nature of this disease."

The mother-of-two praised the newly built Cedar Court, in Audlem, near Market Drayton, which is purpose-built for people with dementia, calling it "the way forward" at its official opening yesterday.

"I only wish my parents had been in a place like this," she said. "I've seen so many awful homes. This is furnished like a house would be.

"There's an old typewriter and a potting shed, all sorts of familiar objects. It's like a proper home – that's the way forward.

"There are no vinyl chairs or boiled cabbage smell – there's no feeling that it's an institution. The manager, Caroline, is an absolute angel. She cared for her mum, it's her life. They are really in a safe place here."

• For more information and support for dementia visit www.alzheimers.org.uk or phone their helpline on 0845 300 0336.