There is some evidence that cognitive reframing interventions for family carers of people with dementia are effective.
Dementia care is challenging for family carers. We studied whether they could be helped by cognitive reframing interventions. Cognitive reframing is intended to reduce carers’ stress by changing certain of their beliefs, such as beliefs about their responsibilities to the person with dementia, their own need for support, and why their relatives behave as they do. We found that cognitive reframing has the potential to reduce anxiety, depression and stress. It did not affect carers’ coping or sense of being burdened. This review concludes that cognitive reframing might be useful to improve the mental health of informal carers of people with dementia.