Factors influencing the pace of food intake for nursing home residents with dementia: Resident characteristics, staff mealtime assistance and environmental stimulation.
Wen Liu, Ying-Ling Jao, Kristine Williams
PMID 31367399WHAT IT FOUND
Residents with dementia averaged 1.63 bites or drinks per minute.
Faster pace was linked to better eating independence, visual cues, full physical feeding, and environments that actively involved residents, not age, verbal prompts, or partial physical help.
Key findings
01Residents took food or drink an average of 1.63 times per minute, with a range from 0 to 3.6 times per minute.
02Faster pace was associated with better eating performance, visual assistance or full physical assistance at least 1 time per minute, and environmental stimulation that involved the resident.
03Pace was not significantly associated with resident age or the amount of verbal or partial physical assistance.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The analysis was very small: 36 videos from 15 residents and 19 staff. Residents had a narrow range of severe dementia (FAST 6.6 to 7.0), so the study could not examine milder dementia. The videos were observational associations, not tested interventions, so they cannot show that any assistance or environmental change caused faster intake. Several forms of staff assistance and environmental stimulation occurred together, so the contribution of any single component cannot be separated. Some videos were very short, and pace for videos lasting less than 1 minute was primarily an estimate. Assistance types were dichotomized at 1 time per minute, which may hide differences in amount.
Declared interests
No conflict of interest has been declared by the authors.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read these associations as evidence that visual cues, full physical feeding, or environmental stimulation will increase intake. The study observed 36 videos from 15 residents and did not test the interventions.