Nursing Use of Function-Focused Care with Hospitalized Patients Living with Dementia

Older adults living with dementia engage in little physical activity when hospitalized. This has negative implications including functional decline, infections, and longer lengths of stay, and reflects a lower quality of care. One of the approaches used to help overcome challenges to engaging patients in physical activity and optimizing the quality of care provided is referred to as function-focused care. Function-focused care is a philosophy of care in which patients are helped to engage in physical activity, including mobility and self-care, at their highest level during all care interactions. The focus of this study was to describe the function-focused care provided by nurses at 2 and 6 months after exposure to the implementation of Function-Focused Care for Acute Care Using the Evidence Integration Triangle (FFC-AC-EIT). It was hypothesized that in treatment sites there would be an increase in the percentage of routine activities in which nurses provided function-focused care to patients between 2 and 6 months. This was a descriptive study of nurse–patient interactions. At 2 months, 54 nurse–patient observations were done, and at 6 months, 69 nurse–patient observations were done. Out of 19 possible activities in which the nurse could provide function-focused care, the mean number of function-focused care activities performed by nurses at 2 months was 3.2 ( SD = 2.0), or 83% of the observed activities. At 6 months, 2.6 ( SD = 2.6) function-focused care activities were performed and this increased to 86% of the activities observed. There was a mean of 0.5 ( SD = 1.1) or 16% of the observed function-focused care activities not performed at 2 months and .3 ( SD = 0.8) or 11% of observed activities not performed at 6 months. Although there was a limited engagement of patients in physical activity during routine care overall, more function-focused care was provided to patients following the implementation of FFC-AC-EIT, the longer the staff were exposed to the intervention.