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Caregiver‐centered care health workforce competencies: Taking steps to support family caregivers of people living with dementia throughout the care trajectory
Author(s) -
Parmar Jasneet,
Poole Lisa,
Anderson Sharon Dorothy,
Duggleby Wendy,
HolroydLeduc Jayna,
BrémaultPhillips Suzette,
Pollard Cheryl,
Charles Lesley,
Haq Anwar
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
alzheimer's and dementia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 6.713
H-Index - 118
eISSN - 1552-5279
pISSN - 1552-5260
DOI - 10.1002/alz.042977
Subject(s) - workforce , delphi method , dementia , family caregivers , health care , nursing , psychology , workforce development , delphi , medical education , medicine , gerontology , political science , disease , statistics , mathematics , pathology , computer science , law , operating system
Background Family caregivers [FCGs] are the backbone of the health system [1‐3]. They provide over 80% of the care for people with dementia, chronic illnesses and impairments [4 5]. Despite evidence of their contributions and consequences of caregiving, support for FCGs has not been a health system priority [6‐8] . Multi‐level interdisciplinary Alberta stakeholders recommended developing Caregiver‐Centered Care Education for the health workforce to fill this gap [9‐14] . Education to prepare health providers to effectively identify, engage, assess, and support FCGs throughout the care trajectory is an innovative approach in addressing inconsistent system of supports for FCGs [5 6 15‐17] . Objective: We report on development and validation of the Caregiver‐Centered Care Competency Framework to help with curricular design and subsequent evaluation of effectiveness of care providers working within healthcare settings to engage and support FCGs. Project description: We used a modified Delphi approach. In the first 2 rounds, multi‐level, interdisciplinary participants, rated the indicators in terms of importance and relevance. In the 3 rd round consensus meeting, participants validated the final competency indicators in small group sessions. Participants: Expert panel of international, national, and provincial stakeholders were invited to a 2‐day symposium March 14‐15, 2019 and participate in the Modified Delphi Process. Results An expert panel of 42 international, national, and provincial stakeholders participated. Thirty‐four experts (81%) participated in the round 1, 36 (85.7%) in round 2, and 42 people (100%) in round 3. There was stable consensus across all three rounds, 96.07% of participants rated the indicators as essential or important (Round 1, 95.81%; Round 2, 94.15; Round 3, 98.23%). Six competency domains, including indicators, were validated. Discussion: FCG research has been primarily focused on educating FCGs to provide care [18‐20] . Our stakeholder engagement processes [9‐14] is critical to intervention research and practice that supports FCGs. The direct inclusion of multilevel stakeholders, particularly the FCGs, provided a robust forum for discussion and increased consensus around the value of a healthcare workforce trained to support FCGs. Conclusions These competencies will shape the design of educational curricula and interdisciplinary training programs aimed at supporting the health and social care workforce to provide caregiver‐centred care.