The award-winning PEARL (Positively Enriching and enhancing Residents' Lives) programme was developed to enable care homes to move from providing good fundamental care to excellent person-centred dementia care. Trialled extensively by one of the UK's largest care providers, it has been proven to dramatically increase the quality of life of people with dementia living in care homes, significantly reducing the use of antipsychotics and the incidence of stress-related behaviours. This concise and accessible guide, written by the Director of Dementia Care at the care provider which trialled and developed PEARL, describes the key criteria of the programme, and provides best practice guidelines for dementia care practitioners wishing to use the approach in their own care home. With an emphasis on the practical, achievable elements of the programme, and drawing on many useful examples, the author and contributors provide guidelines on, amongst many things, getting the fundamentals of person-centred care right; enabling decision-making; reducing stress-related behaviours; psychosocial treatments; safeguarding; supporting staff; and involving relatives.

Activity and engagement are vital to our well-being throughout our lives and this continues to be just as true of people living with dementia. The activities presented in this book have been designed to provide meaningful engagement for residents, while respecting each individual resident's readiness to engage and participate. This approach to person-centred care has proven to be extremely effective: activities such as Namaste Care and Memory Cafes have engaged residents who had previously not responded to interventions, demonstrably showing an increase in their levels of well-being. Supported by case studies, each chapter will also recommend the best way to implement the ideas discussed in the care home environment and beyond.