Dementia Care Mapping

Dementia Care Mapping (DCMTM) is a tool developed by the late Professor Tom Kitwood, and Kathleen Bredin in the late 1980s and was designed to assess quality of care from the perspective of the person with dementia.

DCMTM is a method designed to evaluate quality of care from the perspective of the person with dementia.  It is used in aged care facilities and is based on the philosophy of person centred care, which promotes a holistic approach to care that upholds the personhood of the person with dementia.

The process of using DCMTM involves observing a number of people with dementia over a period of time and recording information about their experience of care, analysing and interpreting the data and then feeding it back to staff.  This information is then used to draw up an action plan to bring about change and improvements. This is an intensive four day course equipping participants to use DCMTM within their own workplace.  It covers the underlying philosophy or person-centred care, the four coding frames used in DCMTM , the rules governing coding, processing of the data and practical issues around briefing and feeding back to care staff.  Participants take a formal test under exam conditions on the final day of the course (pass mark 60%) to ensure their competence in using the tool.  Those successfully completing this receive a University of Bradford certificate recording their status as a Basic User of the method.

Many people who attend this four day course say, they will never look at a person with dementia in the same way again.  And these are experienced people who have worked in the sector for decades.

DCMTM really does make a difference.

2 thoughts on “Dementia Care Mapping

  1. Hello,
    My name is Laura, I would love to attend the DCM training, could you advise when the next one is scheduled please?
    Regards
    Laura

    • Hi Laura
      We do not have a course scheduled but we do intend to run one later this year. I will place details on this page and also let you know by email privately. Thanks for your enquiry.
      regards
      Bernie

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