Claudia Cooper and Yvonne Birks
Over 700,000 people in England have dementia with their families also directly affected. We need a social care workforce who are skilled and are supported to deliver effective and compassionate care for people with dementia. To see how dementia education and training are best delivered to the social care workforce, we conducted a systematic evidence review, which included published studies (2015-24) that tested training or educational interventions which focused on improving dementia knowledge, understanding and attitudes and dementia care delivery and its impact on clients with dementia or staff. We also conducted a review of policies to identify social and policy contexts relevant to dementia training. We presented our findings to those working in home care and care homes to draw on their experience and ask what might be useful in practice.
We found strong evidence that dementia training in care homes that used staff as “champions” to integrate practice-based learning reduced agitation and other neuropsychiatric symptoms such as apathy or depression in those with dementia. It also reduced the need for antipsychotic medication and overall improved the quality of life of residents with dementia. There was less evidence from home care: training improved the sense of dementia care competence amongst staff and was often delivered to groups. Those who work in home care or care homes supported mandatory dementia training but felt this would be challenging to implement in the current economic context.
Claudia Cooper, Claudia.cooper@qmul.ac.uk
