Investigation into nursing staff knowledge and attitude to dementia.

: The knowledge and attitudes to the concept of dementia of nurses working within the general (N = 70) and psychiatric (N = 236) hospital settings were investigated by questionnaire. The study shows that knowledge was good regardless of type of level of training for basic facts. Nurses also report positive attitudes towards the elderly but there were significant differences when the questions became more controversial. A significant number of nursing in psychiatric units (x2 p < 0.01) favoured euthanasia for demented patients compared with their colleagues in acute general units.