Industry story
Why Dementia Care Staff Burn Out and Leave Their Jobs
caregiving dementia-prevention healthcare stress-management
Dementia care units are bleeding staff, and the conditions Teepa Snow describes make that unsurprising. Workers get extra residents dropped on their assignment without warning, get called to stay past their shift with little notice, earn less than other roles in the same building, and receive training that covers tasks but skips the harder skill of actually connecting with someone whose cognition is failing. That last gap matters most: without it, the work feels unmanageable, and people leave. If you have a family member in memory care, high overtime and a rotating roster of unfamiliar faces are signs worth asking about directly.
Full analysis
Senior care communities — particularly assisted living and long-term care facilities — are struggling to hire and keep staff, with many reporting the highest overtime use of any care sector. Teepa Snow describes the conditions driving turnover: workers are added extra residents without warning, asked to stay over shifts with little notice, given wages below other roles in the same building, and receive little practical training on how to actually connect with people living with dementia — only task-focused instruction.
Comments