Aggressive behaviour of persons with dementia towards professional caregivers in the home care setting: A scoping review

Aims and objectives: To outline and to examine the current research and grey literature on aggressive incidents of persons with dementia towards professional caregivers in the home care setting. We intended to identify evidence and research gaps in this field. Background: Worldwide, around fifty million people are living with dementia. Current research indicates that aggressive behaviour of persons with dementia towards professional caregivers occurs frequently in inpatient settings. However, there has been little research on this phenomenon in the home care setting. Design: The design entails a scoping review using the methodological framework of Arksey and O’Malley and PRISMA-ScR. Methods: A systematic literature search in five databases and a web search in Google Scholar was conducted. Title and abstract screening and a full-text screening were conducted by two independent authors. A free web search for grey literature was conducted in Google. Results: The search yielded 1,376 hits. A total of seven journal articles met the inclusion criteria. In the free web search, six references were identified for inclusion, resulting in a total of 13 references. We identified the following four themes: (1) aggressive behaviour in the context of dementia, (2) triggering factors of aggressive behaviour in persons with dementia, (3) skills and educational needs and (4) hindrances to solving the problem of aggressive behaviour. Conclusions: There is a lack of literature on aggressive behaviour of persons with dementia in the home care setting, and various hindrances to solving this problematic behaviour have been identified. Relevance to clinical practice: For home caregivers, specific education concerning communication skills and responding to aggressive behaviour may help to deal with the situation. A further approach may involve specific training aimed to improve caregivers’ confidence.