Reframing nurses’ time to enhance interpersonal interactions in dementia care
Intended for healthcare professionals
Evidence and practice    

Reframing nurses’ time to enhance interpersonal interactions in dementia care

John Krohne Senior lecturer, School of Sport and Health Sciences, University of Brighton, Brighton, England

Why you should read this article:
  • 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 review

This article has been subject to external double-blind peer review and checked for plagiarism using automated software

Correspondence

J.Krohne2@brighton.ac.uk

Conflict of interest

None 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

Want to read more?

RCNi-Plus
Already have access? Log in

or

3-month trial offer for £5.25/month

Subscribe today and save 50% on your first three months
RCNi Plus users have full access to the following benefits:
  • Unlimited access to all 10 RCNi Journals
  • RCNi Learning featuring over 175 modules to easily earn CPD time
  • NMC-compliant RCNi Revalidation Portfolio to stay on track with your progress
  • Personalised newsletters tailored to your interests
  • A customisable dashboard with over 200 topics
Subscribe

Alternatively, you can purchase access to this article for the next seven days. Buy now


Are you a student? Our student subscription has content especially for you.
Find out more