Association between Quality of Interactions Schedule ratings and care experiences of people with a dementia in general hospital settings: a validation study

Introduction: Establishing methods to evaluate interactions between hospital staff and patients with a dementia is vital to inform care delivery. This study aimed to assess the validity of Quality of Interactions Schedule (QuIS) ratings in relation to the care experiences of people with a dementia in a general hospital setting.

Methods: Four hundred and ninety face-to-face interactions between staff and patients with a dementia (n = 107) on six medicine for older people wards in a UK National Health Service hospital were observed and rated using QuIS and the Psychological Well-Being in Cognitively Impaired Persons (PWB-CIP) tool. We also invited patient ratings for longer interactions (n = 217). Analyses explored associations between QuIS ratings, PWB-CIP ratings and patient ratings.

Results: When QuIS was rated negative, the mean researcher-rated patient psychological well-being was lower (PWB = 7.9 out of maximum score of 10) than when QuIS was non-negative (PWB = 8.8, p = 0.036). Negative QuIS ratings were associated with negative ratings on seven out of ten individual PWB-CIP items. When QuIS was rated negative, the associated patient rating was 4% less likely to be ‘happy’. The patient was also 4% more likely to rate the interaction as ‘kind’. Patients struggled to participate in care ratings.

Conclusions: Some patients found responding to researcher questions difficult or not relevant, reflecting the need for development of more suitable methods in this field. Our findings of an association between lower quality QuIS-rated interactions and lower psychological well-being lend support to the use of QuIS with patient populations that include people with a dementia.