The experience of 82 demented female patients, admitted to Crichton Royal in the period 1957-59, is compared with 107 similar female patients from 1974-76. All finally died in the hospital, or at the closure of the study in November 1981 were long-stay patients there. Results show that on average, each patient in the more recent group spent 24 per cent longer in hospital; the results, however, were only statistically significant in the very elderly--over 85. Further study of the 1970s failed to demonstrate that day care and intermittent holiday admissions had any effect on the length of time the patient spent in hospital on final admission. Using the study data, models of future needs are worked out on the basis of bed requirements for patients admitted without prospect of discharge.