Dementia: a call for a paradigm shift in pre-registration nurse education
Abstract
Dementia is a progressive brain disorder that affects memory, thinking, and behaviour. It is a major global public health concern, with an estimated 55 million people worldwide living with the condition. In the UK there is an estimated 944,000 people with dementia. This number is expected to double by 2050. Dementia is a major cause of disability and dependency, and it places a significant burden on families and carers. The current level of dementia education in pre-registration nursing programmes in the UK is inadequate. There are no pre-registration nursing educational programmes that offer dementia as a speciality. This is a major concern, as nurses are the primary providers of care to people with dementia. This paper argues that dementia should be established as a branch of pre-registration nursing education that leads to a Registered Nurse (RN) – Dementia. This could help to address the shortage of specialist dementia nurses in the country. This article provides an important suggestion for countries with a shortage of specialist dementia nurses to consider establishing a stand-alone pre-registration branch of dementia nurse education. This would result in a more specialised workforce with the skills and knowledge to provide high-quality care to people with dementia.Citation
Tuffour, I. and Ganga, G. (2024) Dementia: a call for a paradigm shift in pre-registration nurse education. Cambridge Prisms: Global Mental Health, 11 , article number e2 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/gmh.2023.80Publisher
Cambridge University PressJournal
Cambridge Prisms: Global Mental HealthType
Journal articleLanguage
enDescription
© 2023 The authors. This is an open access article available under a Creative Commons licence. The published version can be accessed at the following link on the publisher’s website: https://doi.org/10.1017/gmh.2023.80ISSN
2054-4251ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1017/gmh.2023.80
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Except where otherwise noted, this item's license is described as https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/