“I can do that on my own!” On the relevance of subjective factors to the use of formal support, from the perspective of people with dementia

Abstract

Our aim was to reach a better insight of the disposition of people living alone with dementia toward the use of care and support services. In biographical narrative interviews, women and men with dementia communicated to us their opinions, needs, and subjectively perceived level of resources regarding their everyday life and care. Both individual and gender-specific differences concerning the use of formal support become evident in their narrations. We offer indications for a future healthcare practice that is specific to dementia. To fully exploit the potential of participatory research, study designs specific to dementia should be developed further.

Acknowledgements

A special thanks to our interviewees for the participation in our study and their willingness to tell about their life story. We are furthermore grateful to the experts of the group discussion and all the persons and institutions, who helped us with recruiting and getting field access: therapists and physiotherapists, legal guardians, outpatient nursing services, information centers, self-help groups, volunteers, media and close relatives.

Disclosure statement

The authors declared no conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.