Back to Annual Meeting

Back to Annual Meeting

APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Renee L. Beard, PhD, Institute for Health Research and Policy, M/C 275, University of Illinois at Chicago, 1747 W Roosevelt Road, Room 387, Chicago, IL 60608, 312-355-0780, rbeard@uic.edu

The recent trend of diagnosing Alzheimer's disease in the earliest stages renders a growing population of individuals who are more than capable of expressing their experiences and needs. Yet much of the existing biomedical research, opinions, and attention are situated within a discourse of loss, which engenders assumptions that everyday interaction is no longer of interest or relevant to those diagnosed. This pejorative view only exacerbates the divide between diagnosed individuals and their support persons despite the impressive surge to counter such depictions. The ACCESS project (Assessing the Contextual Characteristics of Elders and their Support Systems) was an exploratory study of the practices, perceptions, and health behaviors related to Alzheimer's. The research examined both first-person accounts of living with Alzheimer's as well as the experiences of being a support person. Based on qualitative interviews (n=140), important differences in the ways persons diagnosed and those who support them conceptualize Alzheimer's, what they do to manage their situations, and how they envision the experiences of their counterparts are discovered. A conceptualization of health not in terms of a dichotomy between “independence” and “dependence” but existing on a continuum from self care to full assistance from others, which highlights the crucial transitory period of “negotiated” care, is proposed. Identifying potential changes in health practices and behaviors that occur during this transitory stage is vital to disseminating the possible health consequences, both physical and psychological, that result from these care transitions.

Learning Objectives:

• Identify health practices and behaviors of diagnosed individuals and their support persons.
• Analyze and understand the differences between the perspectives of those diagnosed and their support persons.
• Discuss implications of the findings for future efforts at health promotion aimed at either population.

Keywords: Dementia, Health Promotion

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Not Answered