Practices, challenges, and opportunities when addressing the palliative care needs of people living with dementia: Specialty memory care provider perspectives

Introduction: Palliative care focuses on reducing suffering and improving quality of life for individuals with serious illness and their families. In an effort to develop palliative care interventions for specialty memory care clinics, this study characterizes memory care providers’ perspectives on addressing palliative care needs of people living with dementia (PLWD). Methods: Qualitative interviews with specialty memory care providers were followed by thematic analysis by a multidisciplinary research team. Results: Provider approaches overlap with key domains of palliative care. Approaches unique to dementia include having a detailed understanding of dementia syndromes, behavioral symptoms, and caregiver burden. Challenges were identified related to disease progression, provider-level factors, and systems and cultural issues. Respondents identified training needed to strengthen a palliative care approach. Discussion: There are many strengths of using memory care teams to address palliative care needs of PLWD. However, they may require additional knowledge and training to strengthen their work.