Hepburn, Kenneth

Background: The Integrated Memory Care Clinic is a patient-centered medical home led by advanced practice RNs (APRNs) who provide dementia care and primary care simultaneously and continuously. Methods: We explored the experiences of 12 informal caregivers of persons living with dementia during their first year at the Clinic. Data were analyzed via directed content analysis.

• Caregivers' distress relative to their persons' delusions decreased significantly. • Caregivers' distress relative to their persons' anxiety decreased significantly. • Severity of persons' living with dementia delusions decreased significantly. • Severity of persons' living with dementia depression decreased significantly. • Total symptom severity for persons living with dementia decreased significantly.

Objective: This randomized controlled trial was conducted to determine whether a 12-week home-based aerobic and resistance exercise program would improve physical function and caregiving perceptions among family caregivers (FCGs) of persons with heart failure. Method: Overall, 127 FCGs were randomized to one of three groups: usual care attention control (UCAC), psychoeducation only (PE), and psychoeducation plus exercise (PE + EX).

African American caregivers for persons living with dementia frequently experience emotional strain, burden, social isolation, and depression. One source of support for them when in distress is their church community. However, many African American churches do not have programs to support families and congregants living with dementia. Dementia often restricts persons living with dementia and their caregivers from attending church.

Caregivers of individuals with dementia are at risk for chronic stress and social isolation. These exogenous factors may lead to perceived stress and perceived loneliness—psychosocial endogenous (subjective) elements of caregiving experience. Chronic stress and perceived loneliness may disrupt neuroendocrine and neuroimmunological regulation, creating low-grade systemic inflammation, promoting proinflammatory gene expression, and expediting cellular aging (endogenous physiological factors). These disturbances may enhance caregivers' risk for chronic conditions of inflammatory pathogenesis.

Many informal caregivers of persons with dementia suffer adverse health consequences. Although established psychoeducation programs are known to benefit caregivers, attending in-person programs is challenging for them. To address this challenge, the Savvy Caregiver Program, an evidence-based psychoeducation program with demonstrated effectiveness for caregiving and disease-related outcomes, was transformed into an on-line program, Tele-Savvy. This article describes the rationale for and design of a prospective longitudinal randomized controlled trial (targeted N = 215), currently underway.