Mealtime nonverbal behaviors in nursing home staff and residents with dementia: Behavioral analyses of videotaped observations.
Wen Liu, Yelena Perkhounkova, Kristine Williams and 2 others
PMID 35131660WHAT IT FOUND
In nursing home meals, residents with dementia showed challenging nonverbal behaviors in 79.1% of coded behaviors.
Staff used person-centered nonverbal care in 90.6% of coded behaviors, but task-centered behaviors appeared in 70.9% of videos.
Key findings
01Residents' nonverbal mealtime behaviors were mostly challenging (79.1%), and prolonged or continuous chewing/sipping was the most common behavior (n=265).
02Staff nonverbal mealtime behaviors were mostly person-centered (90.6%), but task-centered behaviors were observed in 70.9% of videos.
03Staff modifications of resident abilities were associated with resident chewing/swallowing difficulties and resistive behaviors.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
The sample was small: 110 videos of 25 residents and 29 staff in 9 nursing homes. All residents were white, and most staff were nursing assistants, so findings may not apply to other settings or groups. The videos captured one-on-one interactions and portions of meals, not whole meals or more complex group interactions. The videos were collected before staff training in the parent trial, so they may not reflect usual mealtime care after training. Analyses did not control for clustering of videos within staff, residents, or dyads. The type of meal was not described. The coding scheme had fewer positive or neutral resident codes and task-centered staff codes than challenging or person-centered codes. This imbalance may affect the reported proportions.
Declared interests
No conflict of interest was declared by the authors. The supplied publication types include NIH extramural support, but the article text does not name a funder.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the staff-resident associations as proof that staff nonverbal strategies caused resident behavior or improved intake. This was an observational analysis of baseline videos, not a tested intervention.