Lintern, T: Improving Quality in Dementia Care

This book describes a research study examining the impact of staff attitudes on quality of care and quality of life of people with dementia, and whether changes in these occur as a result of training and development interventions. The research includes a review of existing attitude measurements and the development of a new attitude scale for use with dementia care professionals, offering evidence for its reliability and validity. In order to evaluate quality of care, a new observational technique is developed, which draws on previous observational methodologies, with a focus on the behaviour of staff during their care of people with dementia. Results suggest that staff with more hopeful attitudes about people with dementia are more likely to engage in social interactions and activities with residents and use more quality indicators (such as giving choice and information) during care tasks. The study also showed improvements in staff attitudes, the quality of care provided and in resident well-being following a number of training and development inputs. Implications and limitations are discussed.