Family Care Partner's Preparedness in Caring for Hospitalized Persons With Dementia

Objectives: To examine care partner preparedness in caring for recently hospitalized persons with dementia and care partner characteristics associated with preparedness at discharge, 2 months, and 6 months post discharge.

Methods: Stepwise regression in a sample of 461 care partners of hospitalized persons with dementia who participated in the Fam-FFC clinical trial.

Results: On average, care partners were 61.81 years old (SD = 14.19) and primarily female (n = 334, 72.5%). Care partners reported having some preparedness in general and it increased from discharge (23.75, SD = 6.78) to 2 months (24.5, SD = 6.49) and 6 months (26.35, SD = 6.73). Multiple care partner characteristics were associated with preparedness at discharge [age (b = -0.071; p < 0.001), burden (b = -0.283; p < 0.001), and depression (b = -0.284; p < 0.01)], 2 months [burden (b = -0.226; p < 0.001), strain (b = -0.144; p < 0.05), depression (b = -0.185; p < 0.05)] and 6 months [burden (b = -0.164; p < 0.01), strain (b = -0.183; p < 0.05), depression (b = -0.279; p < 0.01)] post discharge. While care partners' feelings of greater burden and depression were associated with lower preparedness at all time points, care partners' higher age was associated with lower preparedness at discharge only and care partners' feelings of higher strain was associated with lower preparedness at two and 6 months post discharge.

Conclusion: Findings suggest the need to address care partners' feelings of burden, strain, and depression with tailored interventions and programs to optimize their preparedness in meeting unique care needs of hospitalized persons with dementia. Resilience-based interventions and programs can be useful to manage feelings of burden, strain, and depression and optimize preparedness.