Support for the Supporter: Dance/Movement Therapy with Community Dwelling Spouses of Long Term Care Residents Diagnosed with a Dementia Related Illness: A Clinical Case Study

This thesis is the summation and findings of a clinical case study regarding dance/movement therapy with community dwelling spouses of long term care residents who have been diagnosed with a dementia related illness. The intention of this research was to raise awareness of the underserved population of supporters, and to examine how dance/movement therapy could serve to aid in the treatment of the issues community dwelling spouses face. Due to the scarcity of the literature on the primary topic, various relevant topics were examined. Research was found proving that anxiety, depression, and stress are the most prevalent issues being faced throughout the populations of in-home and community dwelling caregivers. Yet, issues regarding identity, roles and responsibilities, guilt, and boundary ambiguity were also of importance within the literature. In order to determine the presenting issues of the clients in this particular clinical case study, a needs/assessment treatment plan was implemented, and the Relative Stress Scale was administered for pre and post test results of the six week dance/movement therapy sessions. During these sessions, the clients were afforded the opportunity to express themselves in regards to their current situations as community dwelling spouses. Universality and normalization of feelings were emphasized throughout the sessions as the clients became more open with each other and themselves. Evidence of an increase in self esteem, a positive change in attitude, the development of positive coping skills, and a physical, mental, and emotional decrease in symptoms of depression and anxiety resulted from the sessions. The results of this study correlate with the findings of previous research and suggest a reason to address the needs of this population. Questions and implications for further research are discussed as a means of suggestion for how these needs might be met

Heart rate monitoring, activity recognition, and recommendation for e-coaching

Equipped with hardware, such as accelerometer and heart rate sensor, wearables enable measuring physical activities and heart rate. However, the accuracy of these heart rate measurements is still unclear and the coupling with activity recognition is often missing in health apps. This study evaluates heart rate monitoring with four different device types: a specialized sports device with chest strap, a fitness tracker, a smart watch, and a smartphone using photoplethysmography. In a state of rest, similar measurement results are obtained with the four devices. During physical activities, the fitness tracker, smart watch, and smartphone measure sudden variations in heart rate with a delay, due to movements of the wrist. Moreover, this study showed that physical activities, such as squats and dumbbell curl, can be recognized with fitness trackers. By combining heart rate monitoring and activity recognition, personal suggestions for physical activities are generated using a tag-based recommender and rule-based filter

A Sensing Platform to Monitor Sleep Efficiency

Sleep plays a fundamental role in the human life. Sleep research is mainly focused on the understanding of the sleep patterns, stages and duration. An accurate sleep monitoring can detect early signs of sleep deprivation and insomnia consequentially implementing mechanisms for preventing and overcoming these problems. Recently, sleep monitoring has been achieved using wearable technologies, able to analyse also the body movements, but old people can encounter some difficulties in using and maintaining these devices. In this paper, we propose an unobtrusive sensing platform able to analyze body movements, infer sleep duration and awakenings occurred along the night, and evaluating the sleep efficiency index. To prove the feasibility of the suggested method we did a pilot trial in which several healthy users have been involved. The sensors were installed within the bed and, on each day, each user was administered with the Groningen Sleep Quality Scale questionnaire to evaluate the user’s perceived sleep quality. Finally, we show potential correlation between a perceived evaluation with an objective index as the sleep efficiency.</p

Caregiver Burden in Dementia: An Occupational Therapy Perspective

Caregiver burden impacts over 16 million caregivers of people with dementia in the United States (Alzheimer’s Association, 2020). Education for caregivers of people with dementia is a critical area of need in occupational therapy. The purpose of this knowledge translation doctoral project was to increase occupational therapy practitioner’s awareness of the importance of utilizing evidence-based tools to address the growing need of caregiver education in community-based application models. The three knowledge translation projects focused on current literature, bridging the research to practice gap, and empowering occupational therapists to forge a larger role in the important area of caregiver education for caregivers of people with dementia. The first knowledge translation project was a continuing education session presented through the Minnesota Occupational Therapy Association targeting occupational therapy students, occupational therapy practitioners, and occupational therapy educators. The second knowledge translation project was a guest lecture at the University of Minnesota for entry-level doctoral students. The third knowledge translation project was a virtual poster delivered at an interdisciplinary conference at the Minnesota Gerontological Society annual conference. The goal of these three knowledge translation projects was to inform, inspire, and lead occupational therapy practitioners, students, educators, caregivers, and professionals from aging related fields in evidence-based research in the area of caregiver education for caregivers of people with dementia