dementia care providers: Do you sometimes feel like your job is impossible?

As a CDP, it is remarkably both rewarding and emotionally draining. However, love, contact, and interaction are even more rewarding. When you feel helpless or immensely challenged, take a moment and regroup and start again.

Vincent Petrosini, DNP (c), MSN, RN, ACRN, FNP, NE-BC, CDP, LNHA

No, I think it will be possible as soon as.

You’re basically a pre hospice nurse. No good answer. It’s a specialty/sub-specialty where you aren’t going to make your patient better. They are going to decline. You are just there to keep them hydrated and keep UTIs away. So the remaining days are good ones. Or the best possible.

It can be an incredibly taxing job both mentally and physically, but with enough training it can be a lot easier. I think you have to have an enormous amount of patience and support from other staff. Support from the physician and social worker with a newly diagnosed patient can help the family understand what's typical for this population.