Resumen

La enfermedad de Alzheimer (EA) es un trastorno neurológico que provoca la muerte de las células nerviosas del cerebro. Por lo general, la EA comienza paulatinamente y sus primeros síntomas pueden atribuirse a la vejez o al olvido común. A medida en que avanza la enfermedad, se van deteriorando las capacidades cognitivas, entre ellas la capacidad para tomar decisiones y llevar a cabo las tareas cotidianas, y pueden surgir modificaciones de la personalidad, así como conductas problemáticas. En sus etapas avanzadas, la EA conduce a la demencia y finalmente a la muerte.

Once you have your program purpose in clear focus and know how you hope to use the information gathered by the caregiver assessment process, you are ready to tackle the details.  It is important to keep in mind that assessment is not an end point. Rather, it should empower family caregivers to make in-formed decisions and link caregivers with community services. The “nuts & bolts” of caregiver assessment are contained in five questions. We’ll take you through them, one by one. The questions are:

Who Should Be Assessed?

Scenario: The Jones Family

Things to Keep in Mind ...

Whenever possible, use established measures that are:

• practical and applicable to family caregivers
• previously applied, or could be applied, in service settings
• reliable and valid
• cited in the literature

(See Selected Caregiver Assessment Measures: A Resource Inventory for Practitioners in Appendix II). 

What Should Family Caregiver Assessments Include?

While the assessment approach needs to be tailored to your service setting and program, any caregiver assessment should:

• Identify the primary caregiver and other family and friends who are involved in arranging, coordinating or providing care
• Approach issues from the caregiver’s perspective
• Improve caregivers’ understanding of their role and what they need to know to carry out tasks

Commonly held misperceptions about including family members in the assessment process stand in the way of recognizing, understanding and meeting caregivers’ needs. Some of these are:

Family Caregiver Alliance

National Center on Caregiving

Offers comprehensive caregiving information and advice, fact sheets, reports and studies, discussion groups and newsletters for caregivers, practitioners, policymakers and researchers. In addition, a state-by-state resource guide offers a searchable database of publicly-funded caregiver support programs.

Phone: 800-445-8106

Website: www.caregiver.org

Who Are Family Caregivers?

An estimated 44 million Americans age 18 and older provide unpaid assistance and support to older people and adults with disabilities who live in the community. Caregivers are varied in their characteristics, yet research on this increasingly visible group reveals some themes:

The Rosalinde Gilbert Innovations in Alzheimer's Disease Caregiving Legacy Award: 2010 Award Recipients

Four exceptional programs from California, New York, North Carolina and Washington are this year's recipients of the Rosalinde Gilbert Innovations in Alzheimer's Disease Caregiving Legacy Awards. The programs are presented with an award of $20,000 each and will will participate in a breakout session at Aging in America, the Annual Conference of the American Society on Aging in San Francisco on April 28, 2011.