Assisted bathing of older people with dementia: a mixed methods systematic review protocol

The objective of this review update is to determine the best strategies for assisted bathing or showering of older people with dementia.

Bathing is a high-risk activity that can worsen agitated behavior in people with dementia, becoming a source of stress or burden for nurses and caregivers. Since a review was originally published in 2013, new studies have been conducted reporting on various interventions related to assisted bathing and showering.

The review will consider people older than 60 years with dementia, their families, nurses, and formal caregivers. The quantitative component will consider studies that examine interventions aiming to reduce agitated behaviors during assisted bathing. The qualitative component will include studies reporting on experiences of assisted bathing of older people with dementia.

This review update will follow the JBI mixed methods review approach. Published and unpublished studies will be identified from searches of the major international databases and relevant databases for gray literature. Two independent reviewers will carry out screening, critical appraisal, and data extraction. The extracted data will include details about the study characteristics, quantitative results, and qualitative findings relevant to the review. Where possible, quantitative data will be statistically pooled. Qualitative results will be synthesized using the meta-aggregation approach developed by JBI. Finally, the findings from both quantitative and qualitative components will be organized into a line of argument to produce an overall configured analysis. Where configuration is not possible, the findings will be presented in narrative form.

PROSPERO CRD42020208048.