Quality of life in dementia: Conceptual and practical issues

Maximizing quality of life is a primary goal of care for individuals who have irreversible dementia, given the current lack of disease-modifying therapies. A major challenge for care providers is determining what makes life as good as possible over the course of illness in the face of this chronic, progressive disorder that aects every aspect of life. e importance of this goal is reected by the growing research focus on quality of life (QoL) in dementia and the increase in its use as an outcome measure in intervention studies. is chapter examines how QoL in dementia is conceptualized and measured, what we are learning about it and how future research may advance our understanding of this sometimes elusive concept.