Education and training in residential dementia care in Australia: needs, provision and directions.
This paper summarises existing education and training in dementia for aged care workers in Australia. The majority of aged care workers have no formal qualifications, while those with formal qualifications are mostly from a nursing background. Only half of nursing staff have attended any dementia care training. Existing training is either service based and provided in-house or by private consultants, or tertiary institution based and provided by academics and professional educators. There is considerable in-service and one-off service-based training being provided around Australia, but few of these training exercises are linked to competency standards or staff appraisal. While there are some formal courses addressing training in dementia care available in every state of Australia, the emphasis on dementia care within generalist tertiary institution courses for aged care workers varies considerably.
Doyle
C
C
Department of Psychological Medicine, Monash University, Victoria.
Ward
S
S
D001315:Australia; D002983:Clinical Competence; D003479:Curriculum; D003704:Dementia / Q000451:nursing*; D004506:Education, Nursing / Q000458:organization & administration*; D005544:Forecasting; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D007318:Inservice Training / Q000458:organization & administration*; D009735:Nursing Homes / Q000592:standards; D009740:Nursing Staff / Q000193:education*; D011787:Quality of Health Care; D012112:Residential Facilities / Q000592:standards; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires