About Careers MedBlog Contact us
Medindia LOGIN REGISTER
Advertisement

Communication Therapy Helps Couples Dealing With Dementia

by Chrisy Ngilneii on February 22, 2018 at 11:35 AM
Font : A-A+

Communication Therapy Helps Couples Dealing With Dementia

A study of a ten-week communication intervention for family caregivers and spouses with dementia shows that the intervention has the potential to improve communication, research at the Florida Atlantic University finds.

This first-of-its-kind study using a 10-week in-home intervention to support couples affected by dementia is showing that "practice does make perfect," both for the caregiver and the care receiver or person with dementia.

Advertisement


They do it with the best of intentions. "Do you remember our wedding day?" "Who is that person next to you in the picture?" For couples with decades of shared memories, a partner's decline in the ability to communicate is one of the most frightening and frustrating consequences of Alzheimer's disease and related dementias. For these couples, the communication strategies they have used before simply do not work anymore. Impaired communication leads to misunderstandings, conflict, isolation, and loss of intimacy.

By involving both partners in the intervention using coaching and role-playing, researchers from Florida Atlantic University's Christine E. Lynn College Nursing are the first to provide a more complete picture of communication behavior in couples affected by dementia with measurable outcomes.
Advertisement

The study demonstrates how creative ways of working with these couples can change their communication behaviors in just ten weeks.

CARE (Caring About Relationships and Emotions) was designed to increase facilitative (helpful) communication in the caregiver and sociable communication in the care receiver. The relationship-focused intervention also was designed to reduce disabling behavior (impairing engagement such as criticizing or quizzing their partner's memory) in caregivers and unsociable behavior (such as not making eye contact) in care receivers.

A key finding from the study, which pleasantly surprised the researchers, showed that care receivers actually improved more than the caregivers following the intervention. Care receivers, who had moderate dementia, had statistically significant improvement in their social communication both verbally and non-verbally. They were more interested and engaged, maintained eye contact, responded to questions, stayed on topic, and even joked with and teased their partners.

Caregivers' communication also showed a statistically significant improvement in their facilitative communication (promoting engagement) and a statistically significant decrease in their disabling communication.

"Caregivers are not experts in communicating with people with dementia. Sometimes they choose strategies they think are helpful, but may be ineffective. Also, they often give up communicating with their less verbal partners because benefits are not as obvious," said Christine L. Williams, DNSc, principal investigator of the study and a professor and director of the Ph.D. in Nursing Program in FAU's College of Nursing, who designed the intervention program. "By teaching caregivers about their partners' ongoing needs for closeness, comfort, inclusion, love and respect, they can make a difference in how they perceive their spouses and how facilitative communication, both verbal and non-verbal, can contribute to their well-being."

For the study, couples received a manual at the start of the intervention with 10 weekly modules on a wide variety of communication issues. Researchers met weekly with the care receiver and caregiver separately; followed by a meeting with the couple together. At the end of the couples' session, they were asked to converse unobserved by the researchers for about 10 minutes on a topic of their choosing. That session was videotaped.

Researchers assessed caregivers' learning needs, increased their communication self-awareness, knowledge about communication decline in dementia, common care receiver emotional reactions to lost abilities, and how to use communication strategies to maintain a caring relationship. Role-play between the interventionist and the caregiver was incorporated when additional practice was needed to demonstrate a specific strategy. Caregivers were coached to identify their communication style and that of their partners.

Researchers also conversed each week with the care receivers to encourage their efforts to verbally express their thoughts, feelings, preferences and needs.

Williams used a rating scale to measure the outcomes of the intervention and analyzed and scored 118, 10-minute videos of each of the couples' sessions. Measuring both caregiver and care receiver communication weekly over several weeks provided a more complete picture of changes over time.

"This intervention is important because there are no other programs specifically developed for couples where one has Alzheimer's disease or dementia," said Williams. "While marital counseling is available, it's very different when you have one partner who is losing their ability to communicate. We don't teach families how to communicate with someone with dementia and it is desperately needed."

More than 5.4 million American adults in the United States have Alzheimer's disease and related dementias and more than 15 million family members care for them at home. A substantial number of caregivers, 40 percent, are spouses. Spouse caregivers have reported high burden and stress and require $9.7 billion in stress-related health care.

The complete study is published in the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry.

Source: Eurekalert
Advertisement

Advertisement
Advertisement

Latest Mental Health News

Shattering the Stigma: Evolving Landscape of Mental Health Support in the Workplace
Recently, a noteworthy transformation has occurred, with 81 percent of workplaces now placing increased emphasis on employee mental health.
Paradox of Intelligence and Thinking Speed
Individuals with higher intelligence scores demonstrated faster thinking exclusively in simple tasks, while they encountered longer solving times for complex problems.
Sleep Apnea Associated With Smaller Brain Volume, Study Finds
Individuals who have abnormal protein deposits in their brains and also experience more severe sleep apnea are more likely to have smaller volumes in a specific area of the brain.
Understanding the Role of Vulnerable Friends: An Interview With Xingna Qin and Ping Ren
Researchers examined the impact of having vulnerable friends on victimized and depressed adolescents, in a recently published study in Child Development.
Research Finds More Depressed Individuals With Activated Immune Systems Than Expected
A recent research suggests that the prevalence of major depressive disorder (MDD) patients with activated immune systems may surpass prior estimates.
View All
This site uses cookies to deliver our services.By using our site, you acknowledge that you have read and understand our Cookie Policy, Privacy Policy, and our Terms of Use  Ok, Got it. Close
×

Communication Therapy Helps Couples Dealing With Dementia Personalised Printable Document (PDF)

Please complete this form and we'll send you a personalised information that is requested

You may use this for your own reference or forward it to your friends.

Please use the information prudently. If you are not a medical doctor please remember to consult your healthcare provider as this information is not a substitute for professional advice.

Name *

Email Address *

Country *

Areas of Interests