The Dentia Book:

(Currently being translated into English and multiple other languages)

How can we improve the everyday encounters between people with dementia and their caretakers, and thereby preserve dignity and self-esteem and minimize the personal suffering? A high level of skill in elderly-care staff is a prerequisite for good and cost-effective health care and social services. In Sweden, professionals in the field of elderly care are trained using the material that has now become “The Dementia book”.

The different faces of Dementia Disease are presented by the personality sketches and life stories in the book's fact section. The authors have consistently sought to express the medical complex facts in laymans terms. In eight fictional fates (that are based on real life experiences), the reader is guided through many manifestations of dementia-conditions and dementia. Diary notes kept by people in the book convey an experience of how it can be to live with dementia. The final sections in each chapter contain hands-on advice on how get results, while maintaining the dignity of those affected. Complex care situations are mixed with a review of the underlying cognitive and medical causes. Everything from what happens at the cellular level to complex interpretation of the outside world through sensory organs are portrayed through the various personal portraits.

The book gives a deeper knowledge and understanding of the dementia diseases in themselves, but also of the patient and family experience of dementia, and about how their treatment can maintain the dignity of the person suffering from dementia. The book is suitable for everyone with an interest in dementia, including medical staff, families and students in health the field of healthcare.