• To understand how time spent with a person with dementia provides added value within a care setting
• To recognise how environmental factors can reduce the quality of the time spent with a person with dementia
• To learn about techniques that nurses can use to be more ‘present’ with people with dementia
Spending time with a person with dementia to develop a rapport is vitally important for nurses who are attempting to deliver high-quality care. However, finding opportunities to spend meaningful time with a person with dementia can be challenging due to the nature of busy clinical environments. Further, spending time with people may be considered a non-essential use of a nurse’s time by some colleagues. These factors can result in inadequate outcomes for both the person with dementia and the nurse providing the care.
This article outlines a rationale for reframing the time nurses have available to spend with people with dementia. The author explains the concepts of ‘ways of being’ and ‘mentalising’ and how these can assist nurses to provide a more authentic presence during their interactions with people with dementia.
Nursing Older People. doi: 10.7748/nop.2022.e1402
Peer reviewThis article has been subject to external double-blind peer review and checked for plagiarism using automated software
Correspondence Conflict of interestNone declared
Krohne J (2022) Reframing nurses’ time to enhance interpersonal interactions in dementia care. Nursing Older People. doi: 10.7748/nop.2022.e1402
Published online: 10 August 2022
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