Dementia Care Stop Correcting, Start Connecting!

21 Aug 2026 · 1 min

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Lisa Skinner, a dementia care professional with 30 years of experience, explains why correcting people with dementia about facts and dates backfires. Reality orientation therapy often increases confusion and anxiety. She advocates for prioritizing connection and empathy over correction to improve emotional wellbeing.

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When I first started 30 years ago, the common approach was to correct people living with dementia, to remind them of the correct date, the correct facts, or what was really happening, at least what was happening in my reality. And we called that reality orientation therapy. Even though it was meant to help, I could clearly see then that it often made things much, much worse. It confused people more and increased their anxiety and sometimes even led to extreme emotional outbursts.