O’Conor Explores Caregiver Role in Early Stage Dementia
Caregiving for family members with Alzheimer’s disease or other dementias is often a complicated, long-term commitment. Older adults with dementia almost always have other chronic illnesses and medications to treat them, with many people taking upwards of eight regular prescriptions, according to research. As their family members’ memory and cognitive function deteriorate, caregivers must then adapt to potentially fraught changes in their involvement.
In the first study to examine patient-to-caregiver transitions in medication management among this population, Northwestern University investigators found that older adults in the early stages of dementia may not rely on family caregivers to manage their medication as much as clinicians previously thought.
The study, published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, analyzes interviews with 32 pairs of patients from Chicago diagnosed with mild to moderate dementia or cognitive impairment and their family caregivers. Importantly, both older adults and their caregivers reported significant value in older adult independence.
“I have consistently observed this preference, and yet I continue to be surprised. I often begin these studies expecting caregivers to have assumed a lot of responsibilities but find this is not the case,” said corresponding author Rachel O’Conor, PhD, MPH, a member of the Northwestern University Clinical and Translational Sciences (NUCATS) Institute and Institute for Public Health and Medicine and an assistant professor in the Divisions of General Internal Medicine and Geriatrics at Feinberg School of Medicine.
I have consistently observed this preference, and yet I continue to be surprised. I often begin these studies expecting caregivers to have assumed a lot of responsibilities but find this is not the case.”
The research was funded in part by a National Institute on Aging K01 Award, and O’Conor participated in the NUCATS Institute Succeeding with Your K Award programming, an interactive and supportive peer-mentoring seminar series that allows early-career faculty and postdoctoral fellows to look at their own work and that of others in a critical but supportive manner.
The recent study’s in-depth interviews produced a fuller snapshot of how medications are managed at home. Conducting separate patient and caregiver interviews reduced some of the tension and stigma around the subject, O’Conor said, which allowed interviewees to be more frank. “We were able to build rapport with the participants.”
This qualitative method also allowed researchers to evaluate all the steps involved in medication management, from deciding to fill a prescription to monitoring side effects and proper use.
This article was originally published by the Institute for Public Health and Medicine (IPHAM). The complete article can be found on the IPHAM website.
Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institute on Aging (K01AG070107). This study was also supported in part by an Alzheimer's Disease Core Center grant (P30AG013854) from the National Institute on Aging to Northwestern University, Chicago Illinois. Additionally, institutional support from the National Institutes of Health's National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (UL1TR001422), and the Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center at Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine (P30AG059988).
