A majority of dementia clients live at home with their families, who assist and provide or their daily care. Providing care for the cognitively impaired person in home settings requires that nurses and other health care providers act through the family caregiver, therefore, it is important to view the dementia client and caregiver as a dyad. There is a paucity of research on implementing interventions for the dementia client through the family caregiver and on the caregiver's self- efficacy to implement these interventions. The primary aim of this study is to evaluate an educational intervention program for the caregiver-dementia client dyad to determine if it can improve dressing ability of the cognitively impaired individual and increase the self-efficacy of the caregiver. Specific outcome variables to be studied include: dressing ability of the dementia client, dressing assistance behaviors of the caregiver, and self-efficacy of the caregiver, as well as qualitative data regarding caregiver's perception of the intervention. The study will use a pre-test, post-test repeated measures design with twenty caregiver-dementia client dyads. The caregivers will participate in a general education program which includes: general strategies to assist the cognitively impaired person, skills to assist the dementia clients in dressing, and self-care strategies for the caregiver. They will also participate in an individualized program, based on assessment of the caregiver and the patient during dressing. Dressing ability of the dementia client and assistance behaviors of the caregiver will be videotaped before any intervention, after group intervention, and at the end of the study period. Data analysis will consist of descriptive statistics and analysis of variance to determine differences in outcomes pre and post intervention as well as differences between group intervention and combination of group and individualized intervention. Qualitative data concerning acceptability of the program will be analyzed.
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