Research Proposal: Family Caregiver Support for Dementia Patients

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Research Proposal

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction......................................................................................................................................1
Rationale......................................................................................................................................1
Aim..............................................................................................................................................1
Objectives....................................................................................................................................1
Specifications...............................................................................................................................1
Research Plan...............................................................................................................................2
Literature Review............................................................................................................................2
Introduction..................................................................................................................................2
Therapies and activities for treating people with dementia.........................................................3
Effect of dementia on family caregivers......................................................................................4
Ethical Issues...................................................................................................................................5
Theoretical Framework....................................................................................................................5
Methodology................................................................................................................................5
Limitations.......................................................................................................................................6
Delimitations....................................................................................................................................6
References........................................................................................................................................7
Books and Journals......................................................................................................................7

Introduction
Rationale
Dementia is a neurodegenerative disorder that leads to momentary memory loss as well as
forgetfulness. The disease has affected millions of people across the globe. There has been
identified 800,000 people suffering from dementia in UK and has been expected to rise to the
number of millions by the year 2021. With the increasing number of patients the overall cost of
their treatment is increasing. The cost of treatment can be categorised as long term residential
care, informal carers as well as other primary and secondary care. People suffering with
dementia suffer from shortage of best practice as identified with the help of government reports
and other clinical guidance documents (Tretteteig et.al.2016). People with dementia have been
identified to access the recommended care in a timely fashion with the help of their family,
friends and caregivers.
The outcome of the research will support identifying the extent of care and services that can be
given by family or friend for treating the patients suffering from dementia. In addition to this,
service providers will also identify the challenging factors that restrict them to serve the patients
in an effective manner.
Aim:
To investigate on what type of services, supports and therapies are to be provided by friend or
family caregivers associated with person with dementia that will support improving their health,
wellbeing and quality of life.
Objectives
 To gather secondary data about the services and therapies that can be provided to people
suffering from dementia
 To collect primary data from selected respondents with the help of questionnaire
Specifications
 Gather and evaluate secondary data for developing background and descriptive literature
review

 Deciding on number of respondents who will be patients and service provides including
friends and family
 Gaining written consent from all the respondents
 Conduct questionnaire test for reviewing and validation of questions
 Record responses of respondents with the help of spreadsheet
 Analysis of data with the help of thematic and statistical analysis
 Draw conclusion on the basis of research finding and suggest recommendations
accordingly
 Evaluate methodologies used in the research
Research Plan
Preparing research plan: 1 June
Developing literature review: 5 June
Distribution of questionnaire and consent letter: 25 June
Collecting responses with the help of questionnaire: 5 July
Displaying responses on spreadsheet: 15 July
Completion of analysis: 30 July
Conclusion based on outcomes: 2 August
Report completion: 3 August
Literature Review
Introduction
According to McCabe et.al.(2016) Dementia is the general term that mainly aims to describe the
illness that affects the brain in negative manner. There is several types of common dementias
such as Alzheimer, cardio vascular dementia, etc. The disease is responsible for declining the
overall functionality of the human being and puts negative impact on their behaviour, thinking as
well as their ability to perform regular task and activities. It too affects their sense of hearing,
smelling, touching and feeling. It has been identified that risk of dementia is increasing with
ageing factors; however this is not the only condition that is true for dementia. It can be

experienced by other aged people but commonly it has been identified after the age of 65 to 70
years.
There has been identified several ways of serving people with dementia so that their overall
quality of life can be improved. The acute treatment of dementia is however not possible but till
there are signs of slow progression with the help of services, care and therapies.
Therapies and activities for treating people with dementia
There are several of activities and services that can be utilised for serving the patients with
dementia. Promoting independence plays an important role in improving the health conditions of
patents and facilitates performance in the reasonable manner. This can only be fulfilled with care
and support of friends and families. There are certain interventions that must be selected on the
basis of strengths and needs of individuals. Williams et.al.2018 stated that Communication plays
an important role and is considered as one of the most appropriate psychological interventions.
This will support enhancing the skills of patients and will decrease the dependency level of care.
Families and friends must identify the phrases or words used by patients to express their feelings
and the same must be utilised to interact with them.
Skill training will also facilitate them to undertake daily activities such as dressing, washing,
eating, etc. This has been proved effective in promoting independence and it also reduced the
stress of care givers such as families. Whitlatch and Orsulic-Jeras, (2018) identified that Activity
planning is another crucial intervention that support determining individual strengths and
weaknesses. Care providers along with person with dementia must consider their interests,
preferences as well as past life events so that appropriate activities can be planned accordingly.
For an example, family members can plan for book reading sessions in the daily routine as they
are well aware about their past interest of reading books. This will support developing their mind
and behaviour in terms of following some routine.
Riffin et.al.(2017) stated that Mobility along with rehabilitation programmes are also effective
in treating the individuals suffering from dementia. Dementia largely affects physically in the
later stages of the disease and therefore it is essential for families and friends or caregivers to
promote their mobility. Exercise is one of the ways that can be used for promoting mobility.
There are some specific exercise programmes for such patents that involve gait training, walking,

strengthening of bones and muscles, resistance training, and many more. Major of the
improvements from clinical reports has been identified because of use of walking as well as
frequent conversation. Along with promotion of mobility there are certain rehabilitation
programmes that are meant for looking after the entire needs, strength and weaknesses of people
with dementia and also look after developing the environment that facilitates changes in their
behaviour and activities in positive manner. Care givers involved in such type of rehabilitation
programmes provide adaptive aids and also adopt various communication strategies in organized
manner after determining and examining their needs.
There are certain therapies that assist improving the quality and wellbeing of life of people with
dementia. Orrell, (2018) identified that Cognitive simulation as well as reality orientation theory
that include activities especially designed for stimulating the mind of the person. Such type of
theories has higher focus over reminding on who are they, what are they doing and where are
they. In addition to this, behavioural therapy can be undertaken for changing the behaviour in
terms of aggression, wandering etc. This type of theory is usually undertaken by skilled friends
or relatives. Music therapy is considered as formal therapy for the purpose of enjoyment. It
supports managing difficult behaviour and triggers feelings and memories of people. Music
therapy has helped the people to communicate in better manner.
Effect of dementia on family caregivers
Blom et.al. 2015 said that Care providers play an important role in healing the diseases like
dementia and they are chosen for several reasons. However they face number of obstacles while
balancing care giving with other needs and demands such as career and relationship and many
more. They are at increased risk of depressions, stress, burden as well as other complications
related to their health. There has been conducted number of studies and has concluded that
caregivers experience more stress as compared to the person with major or minor physical
disabilities. Dementia is responsible for increasing the burden of care which is further
responsible for behavioral disturbance or psychological or physical illness. There are several
other issues faced by caregivers such as help in their daily routines, behavioural as well as
psychological problems, family conflicts, and likewise that led to increase the frustration level.

Ethical Issues
There is greater intervention of human responses while conducting the research and therefore it
is important to consider ethical issues which arise at the time of research. Research ethics place
an important role as it reflects the importance of rules while undertaking the process of research.
In other words it can be said that ethical codes while conducting the research reflect the morale
and values of the individual towards the society (Petillion et.al.2017). It is often considered as
morale judgment that guides the researcher to undertake correct things in alignment with
research standards and their usually accepted behavior. Few of the examples of ethical codes that
are essentially to be taken care by researcher for preserving the rights of respondents includes
privacy, anonymity, confidentiality and likewise. Researcher must make sure that these rights
must be upheld in an appropriate and fair manner.
In this context, Research Ethics Committee (REC) plays an important role while managing the
ethical issues faced by the researcher. This is responsible for supervising and scrutinizing the
activities undertaken by the researcher by observing the ethical considerations based on the
principles related to the research. In addition to this REC is liable for monitoring the studies that
involves human studies, revised potential risks, ethical factors of research acceptability,
advantages of studies, etc for encouraging higher ethical standards while conducting research
especially within the health care settings.
Theoretical Framework
Methodology
For investigating about services and therapies that must be used by friends and relatives for
serving the people with dementia, the current research project has selected positivism approach.
The approach has higher focus over viewing the entire phenomenon that is further experienced
with the help of hypothesis (Bell et.al.2018). It is also subjected to general laws and has higher
focus over pure facts, validation and truthfulness of knowledge that is collected with the help of
observation as well as experience, which is further, measured using quantitative methods.

The questionnaire will include 20 questions that is being used for collecting primary data. The
questionnaire will be distributed among caregivers including friends and relatives of the people
suffering from dementia. Later the responses collected with the help of questionnaire will be
analysed statistically. Conclusion will be made on whether the services and therapies currently
adopted by care givers are sufficient or up to mark or still need some improvement for enhancing
the quality of their life and well being.
Limitations
The major limitation while conducting the entire research involves time restriction, number of
participants involved in the research as well as utilization of proxy while conducting
questionnaire survey. The time limit for the entire research that includes larger number of
research activities is estimated to approximately 3 months. This has restricted the use of
resources in larger quantity and overall cost of the project increases. For an example, number of
participants in the research is confined to 10 and this has raised the criticality while analyzing the
research findings (Singh, 2016). In addition to this, because of certain research ethics, it becomes
mandatory for me to participate in the questionnaire survey and this was the reason I used
proxies. Even it was difficult to identify that who has answered the questions and whether the
respondents clearly understood the questions or not.
Delimitations
For producing the best outcomes as per the defined time limit, I have developed a time plan for
managing and organizing the activities included in the research project. This will help me to have
keen observation over all the activities and to determine whether the process is meeting the
defined deadline or not. In addition to this, I will run preliminary test by distributing
questionnaire to some college students so that feedbacks based on improving the questionnaire
can be collected and validity can also be checked. Entire questionnaire will be bifurcated into 3
sections that include brief description about each and every section. It will clearly illustrate on
how to fill up responses so that participants can have better understanding.
Lastly I will focus on selecting the respondents who are truly taking care of people suffering
from dementia and will clearly about aims and objectives of my research (Brace, 2018). This is

to identify on how they will support me in collecting responses with the help of questionnaire.
This will support enhancing their understanding on what this research is based on.
References
Books and Journals
 Bell, E., Bryman, A. and Harley, B., 2018. Business research methods. Oxford university
press.
 Blom, M.M., Zarit, S.H., Zwaaftink, R.B.G., Cuijpers, P. and Pot, A.M., 2015.
Effectiveness of an Internet intervention for family caregivers of people with dementia:
results of a randomized controlled trial. PloS one, 10(2), p.e0116622.
 Brace, I., 2018. Questionnaire design: How to plan, structure and write survey material
for effective market research. Kogan Page Publishers.
 McCabe, M., You, E. and Tatangelo, G., 2016. Hearing their voice: A systematic review
of dementia family caregivers’ needs. The Gerontologist, 56(5), pp.e70-e88.
 Orrell, M., 2018. A cost effectiveness analysis of maintenance cognitive stimulation
therapy (MCST) for people with dementia: Examining the influence of cognitive ability
and living arrangements.
 Petillion, W., Melrose, S., Moore, S.L. and Nuttgens, S., 2017. Research Ethics Review
Processes: Potential Teaching Tools for Health Professions Students.
 Riffin, C., Van Ness, P.H., Wolff, J.L. and Fried, T., 2017. Family and other unpaid
caregivers and older adults with and without dementia and disability. Journal of the
American Geriatrics Society, 65(8), pp.1821-1828.
 Singh, C., 2016. 07_The Concept of Time in Law-Basis of Laws of Limitaion and
Prescription.
 Tretteteig, S., Vatne, S. and Rokstad, A.M.M., 2016. The influence of day care centres
for people with dementia on family caregivers: an integrative review of the
literature. Aging & mental health, 20(5), pp.450-462.
 Whitlatch, C.J. and Orsulic-Jeras, S., 2018. Meeting the informational, educational, and
psychosocial support needs of persons living with dementia and their family
caregivers. The Gerontologist, 58(suppl_1), pp.S58-S73.

 Williams, C.L., Newman, D. and Hammar, L.M., 2018. Preliminary study of a
communication intervention for family caregivers and spouses with
dementia. International journal of geriatric psychiatry, 33(2), pp.e343-e349.