When a Dementia Patient Asks to Go Home, Try This Innovative and Effective Trick

When a Dementia Patient Asks to Go Home, Try This Innovative and Effective Trick

One of the most challenging things about taking care of someone who is suffering from dementia—whether you are that person's spouse, child, or professional caretaker—is knowing how to diffuse a heated or frustrating situation. People with dementia often become angry or confused when they can't have what they want and continue to ask for it over and over again or lash out at their caretakers.

One of these difficult situations occurs when a dementia patient is uncomfortable in their current residence. It may be that he or she now lives in a care facility of some sort and longs to return to their home. Or it may be that he or she is living at home but is remembering a childhood home they'd like to go back to. In either case, it is generally impossible for caregivers to take the person home, leaving them unsure what to do or say to make the patient feel better.

What would you do in this situation? Lie about why you can't take them home? Tell them you'll take them home later? Try to tell them the truth about why they can't go home? Ignore the request completely? None of these answers seems quite right, and yet, what else is there to do?

Luckily, there's someone out there who knows exactly what to do and can teach you to do it effectively too. Teepa Snow, MS, OTR/L, FAOTA, is a dementia care and education specialist with a background in occupational therapy and over 30 years of experience, which has taught her a lot about how people with dementia think and what can be done to help them cope with this horrible disease.

Photo: YouTube/Teepa Snow's Positive Approach to Care Photo: YouTube/Teepa Snow's Positive Approach to Care

In an effort to improve care and quality of life for dementia patients (and their caregivers), Teepa leads classes and seminars focused on difficult dementia-related situations like the one described above.

Teepa is an expert at understanding people's motivations and thought processes, especially people who are suffering from dementia. Her goal is to help caregivers understand the situation from a different perspective—the perspective of someone with dementia—and then give them tools to use in difficult everyday situations as a caretaker. She creates unique environments where her students can practice using their new techniques so that they can find where their stumbling blocks (or "uh-ohs") are and learn to overcome them in real life.

Photo: YouTube/Teepa Snow's Positive Approach to Care Photo: YouTube/Teepa Snow's Positive Approach to Care

In the case of a dementia patient who requests to go home, the key question Teepa asks her students is this: "How can I make you want to be with me?" She knows that most people would rather be at home than in a care facility or in a classroom. But she seeks out creative ways to give seniors (and her students) a reason to want to be where they are.

Photo: YouTube/Teepa Snow's Positive Approach to Care Photo: YouTube/Teepa Snow's Positive Approach to Care

This instructor is the best possible combination of entertaining and educational, humorous and knowledgeable. Check out the video below to see one of Teepa in action at one of her training sessions and learn one very helpful trick for dealing with a dementia patient who wants to go home.

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Elizabeth Morey

Elizabeth Morey graduated summa cum laude from Aquinas College in Grand Rapids, MI, where she dual majored in English Literature and Spanish with minors in Writing and Business Administration. She was a member of the school's Insignis Honors Society and the president of the literary honors society Lambda Iota Tau.

Some of Elizabeth's special interests include Spanish and English linguistics, modern grammar and spelling, and journalism. She has been writing professionally for more than five years and specializes in health topics such as breast cancer, autism, diabetes, and Alzheimer's disease. Apart from her work at GreaterGood, she has also written art and culture articles for the Grand Rapids Magazine.

Elizabeth has lived in the beautiful Great Lakes State for most of her life but also loves to travel. She currently resides a short drive away from the dazzling shores of Lake Michigan with her beloved husband.

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