The current project is designed to develop a low-cost, telephone-based intervention to reduce anxiety, depression, and feelings of burden and stress in caregivers of patients with dementia, as well as to improve quality of life and family functioning. Secondary aims are to determine whether the intervention can reduce behavior problems in dementia patients and increase the time to institutionalization. The overall goal of the current project is to establish preliminary efficacy of the intervention to support an examination of the intervention in a subsequent large scale trial to be submitted as a future RO 1 application. The initial phase of the project will involve adapting an existing telephone-based intervention for stroke caregivers to use with caregivers of patients with dementia, as well as creating measures of treatment satisfaction and intervention compliance and adherence. The intervention will be pretested in fifteen dementia caregivers to collect feasibility and usability data to make further modifications of the intervention. A randomized, controlled pilot study will follow to compare the intervention to standard care for reducing caregiver distress. Seventy primary caregivers of patients formally diagnosed with dementia will be recruited. Caregivers in both groups will receive a resource packet containing information about caring for someone with dementia and a listing of local resources. Caregivers in the comparison group will not receive the intervention, but will not be restricted in their use of available, standard care interventions, The intervention group will receive a series of telephone calls over 12 months, during which emotional support and training in problem-solving skills will be provided by trained therapists. Caregivers in both groups will be assessed at pre-treatment, mid-treatment (6 months), post-treatment, and follow-up (3 months post-treatment) in their homes. It is hypothesized that the intervention will result in reduced caregiver burden and emotional distress, as well as improved quality of life and family functioning and increased use of community resources.
| Tremont, Geoffrey; Davis, Jennifer Duncan; Bishop, Duane S et al. (2008) Telephone-Delivered Psychosocial Intervention Reduces Burden in Dementia Caregivers. Dementia 7:503-520 |
| Epstein-Lubow, Gary; Davis, Jennifer Duncan; Miller, Ivan W et al. (2008) Persisting burden predicts depressive symptoms in dementia caregivers. J Geriatr Psychiatry Neurol 21:198-203 |
| Davis, Jennifer Duncan; Tremont, Geoffrey (2007) Impact of frontal systems behavioral functioning in dementia on caregiver burden. J Neuropsychiatry Clin Neurosci 19:43-9 |
| Steadman, Pamela Lea; Tremont, Geoffrey; Davis, Jennifer Duncan (2007) Premorbid relationship satisfaction and caregiver burden in dementia caregivers. J Geriatr Psychiatry Neurol 20:115-9 |
| Spitznagel, Mary Beth; Tremont, Geoffrey; Davis, Jennifer Duncan et al. (2006) Psychosocial predictors of dementia caregiver desire to institutionalize: caregiver, care recipient, and family relationship factors. J Geriatr Psychiatry Neurol 19:16-20 |
| Tremont, Geoffrey; Davis, Jennifer Duncan; Bishop, Duane S (2006) Unique contribution of family functioning in caregivers of patients with mild to moderate dementia. Dement Geriatr Cogn Disord 21:170-4 |
