Abstract

The Effect of Dementia Family Education Program
for Dementia Recognition, Burden and Depression
in Dementia Caregivers

Lee, Sun-Ah

Department of Nursing
Graduate School, Kyungpook National University
Daegu, Korea
(supervised by Professor Kim, Hee-Sook)


Purpose: This study aims to investigate the effects of the dementia family education program in dementia caregiver’s dementia recognition, burden, and depression.
Method: A quasi-experimental research with a nonequivalent control group non-synchronized design that is pre and post design was conducted on 26 subjects in the experimental group and 26 subjects in the control group who were dementia caregivers from August 12th 2013 to December 12th 2013. The participants of this study was 52 dementia caregiver''s in D city. In experimental group dementia recognition, burden, and depression were measured before the 1st session and after the last session. In control group dementia recognition, burden, and depression were measured before the 1st meeting and the next meeting that was conveyed eight weeks later with no intervention. The dementia family education program was provided to the experimental group once a week, for 8 weeks, 90 minutes per each session and the was a preliminary and post inspection. The data analyzed through cronbach’s α for reliability, χ2-test, Fisher exact probability test, and t-test for homogeneity, and t-test for the identification of differences between the two groups using SPSS 12.0 program.
Results: The results of this study are as follows;
1) The 1st hypothesis : This hypothesis like ‘Experimental group that participated in Dementia family education program would show increased dementia recognition scores than the control group that did not take part in the program’ was supported(t=4.07, p<.001).
2) The 2nd hypothesis : This hypothesis like ‘Experimental group that participated in Dementia family education program would show decreased burden scores than the control group that did not take part in the program’ was supported(t=-2.90, p=.006).
3) The 3rd hypothesis : This hypothesis like ‘Experimental group that participated in Dementia family education program would show decreased depression scores than the control group that did not take part in the program’ was supported(t=-2.22, p=.034).

Conclusion: This study indicated that the dementia family education program enhanced dementia recognition of dementia caregiver’s, lowered burden and depression. Thus, we strongly recommend using this dementia family education program to dementia caregiver''s which is a result of this study.