The overall goal of the ADEPT project is to enhance the independence, autonomy, safety, and performance of patients with dementia in conducting activities of daily living (ADL). The overall objective of ADEPT development is to enhance patient care in Special Care Units (SCUs) through the further development and testing of a computerized, self-directed, training toot for Nurse Aides (NAs) which enhances their capacity to provide high quality support to patients in the core ADLs of bathing, dressing, and eating. The underlying philosophy for ADEPT development is to apply the principles and methods of human factors engineering (HFE) to the improvement of care for patients with dementia. The major HFE method to be implemented is task analysis to model patient activities in each ADL, and to identify the requirements associated with successful performance of each task. ADEPT allows caregivers to identify those task performance elements that require assistance and provides recommendations for appropriate intervention strategies. This approach enhances the independence of elders, fostering their ability to maintain/retain functioning to the maximum level at which they are capable or motivated to achieve. Furthermore, the tool provides the health care industry with a method for appropriately training staff to match the capabilities and limitations of the elderly with appropriate care provided by Nurse Aides. The Phase I ADEPT project resulted in the development of a prototype tool that incorporated the dressing ADL. ADEPT-It will build on this by improving the prototype toot, increasing it's usability and interactivity by subjecting the tool to usability testing with prospective users, and extending its application by incorporating the eating and bathing ADLs. ADEPT-Il will also incorporate an assessment module to rate appropriateness of NA assistive intervention choices during training.
