Miami University

Challenges in Caregiving and Creative Solutions: Using Technology to Facilitate Caring for a Relative with Dementia
Jennifer M. Kinney

Cary S. Kart
Latona D. Murdoch
Tammy F. Ziemba

2003

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Borrowing principles from total quality management and the emerging consumer-satisfaction movement in the field of aging, we explored how technology might assist family members who are caring at home for a relative with dementia. In Phase 1, focus groups with a total of 26 current and former caregivers revealed that caregivers and the relatives for whom they care

struggle to maintain continuity of roles, relationships, and lifestyles, and that safety is a key concern. Despite the limited use by some caregivers of "low-tech" tools (e.g., door alarms, intercoms), caregivers lack a comprehensive system to enhance their relatives' safety. In Phase 2, we identified an Internet-based monitoring system to address caregivers' major concerns. In Phase 3, focus groups with eight caregivers evaluated the system that was identified in Phase 2. Results suggest that affordable technologies exist to assist family caregivers, and that these caregivers were amenable to the use of these technologies.

(Published in Ageing International, [Summer] vol. 28, no. 3 , 295-314)

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