In the Netherlands, it is estimated that yearly between 40,000 and 160,000 patients develop delirium in the hospital. In a substantial part of the hospitals, a hospital-wide policy regarding prevention, treatment and care of patients with delirium is missing. However, in 2010, The Dutch Health Care Inspectorate launched new regulatory that requires that by 2012, every hospital has to have a delirium screening program and a hospital-wide protocol for delirium in patients of 70 years and older. Secondly, despite the fact that at this moment only around two-third of the hospitals are equipped with a geriatric team, there has to be 24h availability of specialized personnel for the management of delirium. In this article, the management for an average patient with delirium is described based on the Dutch national guideline for delirium of 2005. We expect that the insufficiencies in delirium care found by the Inspectorate will not be solved in 2012, but hopefully this new policy will help doctors and hospitals with tools and new incentives to develop better standard care for patients with delirium in the future in the Netherlands.