Person-centredness in dementia care: study protocol for an integrative review of theoretical approaches

The concept of personhood is particularly important in person-centred dementia care because its overall aim is to maintain the personhood of people living with dementia despite disease progression. In a previous review on autonomy for people with dementia, two different underlying concepts of personhood were identified: a rationalistic and a social constructionist concept of personhood. The present integrative review aims to (1) identify existing theoretical approaches in person-centred dementia care, (2) describe the constitutive components for these theoretical approaches, (3) report the goals and/or outcomes to be achieved by person-centred care for people living with dementia and (4) identify the underlying concepts of personhood.

For our integrative review the search terms were derived from the research questions and clustered according to the 'PICo' (Population, Interest, Context) framework. A systematic literature search for theoretical approaches of 'person-centred dementia care' will be performed on MEDLINE (via PubMed), CINAHL (via EBSCO) and PsycINFO (via EBSCO). The title/abstract and full-text screening will be performed independently by two researchers according to the inclusion criteria. The data analysis procedure will have two steps: (1) identification and extraction of general information (e.g., type of publication and name of theoretical approaches described) and (2) a qualitative content analysis to analyse the components, goals, outcomes and understanding of the respective underlying conceptions of personhood within the theoretical approaches. The extraction of general information (e.g., authors) will be performed by one researcher and qualitative content analysis will be performed independently by two researchers using MAXQDA software. Any disagreements will be resolved through discussion between the two researchers or, if no consensus can be reached, with all coauthors.

Due to the nature of a review, ethical approval is not required. We will disseminate our results in peer-reviewed journals and at (inter)national conferences.