What is it about?
Dementia has predominantly been explored from the carer perspective, focusing on the negative impact of stress and burden associated with supporting a family member or friend during the stages of progressive decline associated with dementia. This study clarified how the the person with dementia and their family carer together make meaning from their experiences of living with dementia. Semi-structured interviews were used to examine the effect of living with dementia on the dyads’ confidence in managing the dementia related behavioural and functional changes they experienced and their access to and impact of informal and formal support networks.
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Why is it important?
Coping with dementia is frequently uncertain and unpredictable and necessitates fundamental changes to everyday living. It is not uncommon for the relationship between the person with dementia and close family members to breakdown as a result of dementia related changes. Nurses play a significant role in advising and supporting care recipient/carer dyads living with dementia, and a better understanding of the couples perspective provides them with essential information to support self-management.
Perspectives
It is evident that couples affected by dementia require ongoing support to adapt to the changes in capacity and relationships they experience as the condition progresses. Both members of the dyad were having to adjust to a change as the carer progressively took on more responsibility. Widespread negative perceptions of dementia were having a significant impact on the dyads’ self-efficacy in symptom management and service access. The findings contribute a comprehensive understanding of the impact of dementia on dyadic self-efficacy that can be used to support psychosocial intervention development. A key focus of interventions should therefore be on reducing the risk of dyadic relationship stress, and potential for breakdown of the caregiving relationship. The considerable impact of stigma on self-efficacy also indicates that supportive disclosure strategies have a role to play in dementia care interventions.
Gillian Stockwell-Smith
Griffith University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: The impact of early-stage dementia on community-dwelling care recipient/carer dyads’ capacity to self-manage, Journal of Clinical Nursing, September 2018, Wiley,
DOI: 10.1111/jocn.14657.
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