Educating nursing staff involved in the provision of dementia care.

Evidence from several studies suggests that general nurses and acute health care staff do not always have an adequate understanding of the needs of people with dementia. This has major implications for the quality of care that is delivered and the well-being of people with dementia and a concurrent medical or surgical condition. This article describes how the creation of the role of nurse educator in dementia care helped to address this problem in one NHS trust.