Interventions for confusion and dementia. 1: Quality of life.

This series of articles examines some of the more commonly used interventions for confusional states/dementia. This article explores issues around quality of life. Quality of life is a subjective and potentially undefinable concept. Yet in recent years it has been used widely in the nursing literature. However it is defined, it is fundamental to humanity and underpins all the interventions discussed in the later articles. When continuing health care fails to offer hope of a medical cure, the focus necessarily shifts to care. Good care and quality of life are inextricably linked. This article raises awareness of some key issues to guide readers when deciding whether or not to adopt a particular intervention; a prescriptive approach to quality of life is deliberately avoided. Later articles in this series will discuss reality orientation, reminiscence, validation, and multisensory environments.