Vardag i olika världar: om dementa och vårdbiträden på tre gruppboenden

Sammanfattning: This thesis is about the residents and employees at three group homes for older people suffering from dementia. The empirical data comprises princi- pally of participant observation and interviews with caregivers. The aim of the dissertation is to describe and understand what happens during daily life at a group home for elderly suffering from dementia. The ambition is to understand the patterns of action in a "relation-oriented perspective" where the interpretative model is taken from social psychological and psychological theory. A categorisation of the residents based on how their demands are expressed in relationship to the people around them is constructed. Four different levels of demands are formulated. 38 caregivers, all women, are interviewed. The staffs of the three group homes do not differ from one another in the actions but within the staff groups two different attitudes have been differentiated. One group termed "the disappointed" comprises of 28 of the 38 care- givers and in the other group, called "those who can" we find ten caregivers who both in words and deeds show that they have the energy and willing- ness to carry out their jobs. The three group homes are dominated by conditions which one could say group homes were created to avoid. Even if the mode of expression varies bet- ween different levels, there are certain common features in the actions of the residents who all express a desire to be in company of the caregivers. With regard to the caregivers, the difference between the two groups has to do with their contact with the residents. While "the disappointed" spend a great deal of their time with each other, "those who can" spend their time at work with the residents. The impact of the illness dementia on cognitive functioning, with its ever-present threat of dissolving identity and a reality which is not shared by those around, means that even the identity of the caregivers i threatened. The caregivers classified as "the disappointed" therefore seek out each other to have their own identities affirmed. It is probably more difficult to understand how "those who can" actually manage than to understand how the group of "the dissapointed" do not manage in their intercourse with the residents in this daily life in different worlds.